SPI 263: Laddering Up: How to Build a 7-Figure Business by Building a $7K per Month Business

By Pat Flynn on April 26, 2017

Clay Collins of LeadPages returns to the Smart Passive Income Podcast for another incredible, value-packed (and potentially record-breaking) episode. This time, Clay is dropping serious knowledge on building a seven-figure business, step by step. [Full Disclosure: FYI, I’m a compensated advisor and an affiliate for LeadPages.]

During his time as CEO and co-founder of LeadPages, Clay has watched his business grow from a humble blog to a seven-figure company with a sprawling array of product offerings. He’s got his process for scaling a successful business down to a science, and that’s what he’s sharing here today.

Clay’s got big plans for this episode: He wants to break his own record for the most downloads of an SPI Podcast episode (Episode 78). He wants to pack hundreds of dollars of value—the equivalent of an online course—into one interview. And he wants you to walk away with a framework you can implement today to turn your business into a million-dollar operation.

Today's Guest

Clay Collins

Here today is Clay Collins, LeadPages CEO and co-founder, dropping expert knowledge on how to build a seven-figure business, step by step. [Full Disclosure: As an affiliate I receive compensation if you purchase through this link.]

I’ll be here in the comments answering questions. Please let me know if you have any.

Sparkle

I’m new to the online world of course creation. Clay, do you think its better to first focus on creating a salespage for my lead magnet (an email challenge)? Or focus on the content of the salespage for the paid product (a course on self publishing)?

I think job #1 is to create an audience email list of 2K subscribers. Also, you don’t need an entire sales page for your lead magnet.

Sparkle

I’m sort of relieved. There are online course creators who’s messaging is that they’ll show people how to create and sell a product in 1 month or 2 months. I’ve got a small list (less than 100) and launched an email challenge yesterday. I was going to see who was interested in a beta course next month. Now I see that this approach isn’t correct and will focus on list-building.

Clay, thank you SO much for this valuable share!! I meet so many business owners (and honestly myself at times included) that are more concerned with profit and product creation than simply growing, understanding and nurturing their target audience. I know that revisiting this basic yet complex step will be fundamental in successful content marketing/ digital marketing in the future. I’m currently trying to understand Drip – wish me luck. Thanks again!!

Simon

Clay, I love the work that you have done with Pat!

I have been using Drip.co for a while now, but still trying to learn to set up everything, especially writing email templates, it’s my worst problem.

As far as the 2nd ladder goes, I think I have it up-side-down. I followed Brian Harris’ tip in sending out validation emails to my focus group that I have acquired from Facebook. Then in the meantime, I was actually already been creating my product.

So far I have received a few offers, and today’s my first day of launch. In this case, how should I proceed?

Thanks in advance!
Simon

Latisha Grady

Hi Clay. First of all may God bless and favor you and Pat for being SOOO DIFFERENT from the online marketing pack in terms of the value you bring. You echo’d many of my concerns as I observe “coaches” and “courses” being thrown together motivated 1st my “monetizing” their audience. You guys are my model and I rarely listen to any others. That said, I need you to briefly define content marketing for me. For, I’m leaning toward content marketing being my 1 traffic source. But I’m inclined to think that part of my “marketing of the content” would involve buying PPC ads (specifically FB/IG ads) to distribute that content? Am I wrong? For isn’t “content marketing” using such to distribute (market) the content? Please clarify.

Mark McConkie

How would the MVA / First Step in the Ladder change in B2B sales? I think that my business will focus mainly on B2B. I’d like to eventually sell an online training package to businesses to help their IT personnel pass a certification exam (specifically ITIL). My original plan was to build the training package and then use personal selling as a way to gain sales. I’ve reached out to my last employer (they are the ones who had me go through the certification process) and they seem interested in my model. What should the first step in the ladder look like for me where I’m not as focused on B2C?

Hello Clay and Pat. I am a blogger at vincentwoodard.com and I think I will start focusing on YouTube videos as my number one conversation source. I think videos will help people think of my face when people think of my niche, which is helping people find spiritual answers to worldly issues. This would also grant me more access to speaking engagements and consultations.

This podcast was SUPER AWESOME and I am even more inspired to give more of myself to help other get more out of their lives. THANKS!!!! P.S I would love it if you pick me as one of the winners of the lifetime access to Leadpages 🙂

That said, I’m probably at rung -1 right now. My question is:
First step is to get to 2k subscribers. But, once I’ve identified a topic, how do I drive readers to the blog and what cadence should I be posting at in order to get enough traffic to start collecting email addresses? I’m guessing that its not as simple as, just start writing and readers will come.

Thanks again! I am a bit of an over-analyzer and it’s prevented me from ever starting in the past. Really looking forward to taking action rather than analysis paralysis!

Clay and Pat– awesome podcast. I am just finishing Marie Forleo’s b-school and this content is perfectly timed. As an aside, two friends separately referred this podcast to me– I think this mini-course is exactly what people are looking for right now. Nice job!

Ok! 2k subscribers– on it! I love this goal because I can spend the next 3-6 months testing the market to better identify my ICA and their pain points. If there isn’t a market, I have only “wasted” 3 months or so. Totally do-able. I love one-on-one discussions with connectors and my potential ICA. I plan to start with “face-to-face” discussions (if possible) while building blog content. That way my blog content is directly tied to real-life stories I am hearing and conversations I am having.

Please continue nurturing your generous hearts- the world benefits!

Nzinga Knight

Hi Clay,
I have 2 businesses… a no no, right?! Well, one is a passion- I’m a fashion designer by trade, and the other is a non-alcoholic beverage business starting with a traditional Caribbean drink that I make really well… I can more readily/ easily see how to level up the drink business (started a year ago) but I don’t want to let go of the fashion one (started 8 yrs ago) because it’s more creative it’s just that that business has been harder for me and I don’t stick to pushing fwd the bness side as much. You can visit my site Nzingaknight.com to see both. Anyway, I’m thinking to go deep and level up and now t sure how to go about this. Please share your words of wisdom with me.

Thanks, Clay. I have 1300 email subscribers. The open rate is ~10%. The niche: personal development. Unfortunately, I couldn’t resist the temptation to branch out and just go super niche like Pat recommended. I have covered all sorts of topics like peak performance, habits, willpower, mental toughness, and so on. I guess most of it can be lumped under peak performance.

Anyhow, I really want to at least monetize eventually and pay for hosting and Aweber, all of which are going up in cost, so I’m break even.

I sent out a question asking readers what they’re biggest problem was and I got ~12 responses. I got an unemployed mother looking to find her passion, I got a few people from Africa looking to try and start a business. Based on that and the emails I get from my first follow up sequence when they opt in, it seems they are all across the board.

Would it be correct to assume that I am not ready to monetize yet? I should still build my email list to maybe 10,000 considering how broad it is? 2,000 may be too little.

It’s not all about money, I’d also like to serve people that energize me rather than those that annoy me. Some of these people, I just can’t help the best and so I direct them away. Ideally, I think I want to serve high performers like Pat, you, Neil Patel, Russell Brunson, Ramit Sethi, etc. who are already proven to execute and want to take it to the next level. Should I tweak my content to only attract these types of people or is that a long short because they’d never listen to someone like me? I believe they can; I just need an angle to make it believable and trustworthy (maybe scientific studies).

As a quick benchmark, when I send an email to my whole list to watch a new youtube video embedded in a blog post. I maybe get ~50 views tops. So that gives you an idea on my CTR and open rate, which tells me that my list is not engaged enough or big enough to make more than a couple sales.

@Will Chou, what are you using for your email marketing? Have a look at Drip to see superb automation capabilities and contact engagement workflows!

Steven Merritt

What an incredible episode!! Thanks so much for the amazing blueprint! I am planning to use the webinar method as you outlined. I believe it gives great opportunity for frequent direct contact with clients and potential clients to help improve the product and offer as you go.

Clay – once again, as usual when you’re on with Pat, just amazing content here. I’ve learned so much from listening to your episodes with Pat that I continue to listen to them over and over again to extract every drop of wisdom from them I can.

My question goes back to rung one on your ladder. You mentioned when you were getting started that you were very intentional and very hands-on with your first commenters, etc. I love that idea and strategy. What did you do to get traffic to your site to begin with? Where and how were you getting traffic to your site that resulted in comments where you were then able to reach out and thank them, engage with them, etc.? A lot of people struggle with both the traffic, and for those who do get traffic, getting comments/engagement. I know that I’ve talked to numerous website owners/bloggers who are frustrated trying to get people to engage and comment. What would you recommend at this very basic, first-steps level for traffic commenting and engagement? Where does that “first” or “next” commenter come from?

I’m personally in the WordPress development space and recently I transitioned my content creation efforts to the branded blog associated with my business. My overall business goal is to help people ship their art so they don’t have to worry about the technical details of designing/building/managing/running their website outside of creating their awesome content that goes on it. My business covers everything from WordPress set up and configuration, to full scale custom WordPress design and development. We’ve got big customers and small ones and I love every one of them, and think they appreciate the hands-on and involved way we do business.

I don’t know if that would violate the one-product rule you mentioned on the podcast, but I see it this way:

Mine is a business that provides world-class web services to those who are looking for solutions to their WordPress headaches.

I’m just getting started – seriously for the first time – to try to build my audience. The business is already there – I’ve been modestly successful over the last few years generating most of my business via word-of-mouth referrals. It’s time to climb that next rung on the ladder for sure. I think that I’ve got proof of my minimum viable product already, but I completely get it and see clearly that I need to work on growing and building the minimum viable audience too. I’m working hard to imitate the great things you’ve done with LeadPages in my own business.

I’m happily a LeadPages customer, and help my clients build and utilize their LeadPages, but I’m also looking for ways to make better use of LeadPages to help build my business.

Tae-Jun Ahn

Clay is a true leader of internet marketing. I currently use leadpages and drip everyday. This is something that I really needed hear at my stage of business development.
Currently I use GoToWebinar for my conversion mechanism.

Keeon Taylor

Hey Pat and Clay I am using a sales page for conversions. I already use leadpages. Im offering a 7 page free ebook which will have a high conversion rate. Once people subscribe to download the free ebook they will then be led to a longer sales page of a low priced ebook. A long well written sales page will convert well because people will believe in the value after reading the first well written free ebook.

Brandon Fong

Hey Clay!

This was so refreshing to hear. This episode was just a true testament to the beauty and evolution of this wonderful world that we all belong to. We all get to “shed skins” as we evolve and grow, and it only ends if we decide to stop. So cool 🙂

I am a 21 year old college student and I got into personal branding after my first startup company failed. I am in LOVE with the audience I serve. I built a list of about ~500 students in 2 1/2 months and used that audience to validate a book idea that I had. I self-published it, and it became a bestseller in 4 different categories, was featured in the Huffington Post, and received reviews from entrepreneurial superstars like Kevin Harrington, original shark on Shark Tank and the inventor of the infomercial.

I am studying abroad (for a second time) and just finished building the new version of my website, brandon-fong.com and this episode truly validated my strategy. My ONLY CTA on my site as of right now is getting a free chapter of my book, and I am planning on segmenting the subscribers based on which chapter they choose and executing the sale through a drip campaign –> sales page. The sale page will have different packages and bonuses that increase the value of my book and allow me to serve my audience more.

I continue to blog and provide video content to my subscribers every week (about 25% open rate). This summer, I am going to focus on hitting that 2,000K subscriber mark and focusing on SEO for my traffic source.

Again thanks for an awesome episode! I’ve enjoyed leadpages SO much since your first episode with Pat. And again awesome value.

Sarah Pust

Hi Clay, thanks for the really great input & knowledge transfer – one thing keeps turning in my head: Why should we concentrate on one channel to get the message out there? I would think that cross media has the best outcome? I understand your productivity reasons, but for example if I focus on Videos, then I have to choose between YouTube (SEO relevant) and facebook (more reach in direct upload) and I will miss all the google traffic if I don’t embed the video with a text in my blog… Or do I get something wrong?

Right now I am starting with my new blog about buiding a personal brand online, it will be in German on http://www.pusteblumemedia.de I will use Videos for traffic sourcing and funnel them into personal mails on my (not yet built) email list. Love to try drip for that – looks great! Thanks for your input! Sarah

Maytal

Really insightful episode, Pat & Clay! It’s obvious how much the two of you care about your audience, and that you are really out there to serve and create more good in the world. I really appreciate your generosity!

I loved that this episode emphasized focus. I absolutely agree that it’s essential for success, and listening to this incredible episode served as a really good reminder!

The conversion mechanism that I focus on is challenges! I love doing challenges with my audience – young kids I teach how to code, and their parents who support them.

Pat – listening to you mention Kevin Kelly’s ‘1,000 True Fans’, reminded me I’ve been meaning to recommend his book, ‘The Inevitable’, for your book club. It has so many great insights, and is just a really fun read, especially for us ‘Back to the Future’ fans… :)))

Becky Lam

Thanks for such a content-filled podcast, Pat and Clay! I am in the middle of formulating a business idea, and am planning to do an ASK campaign first, followed by a webinar (focused on the results of the ASK campaign), The CTA will be to request a free report. I’m ID’ing some potential affiliate possibilities related to my niche for foundational monetization, and will grow from there using JVs and consulting. Appreciate your willingness to share so freely!

Zufar Bikbov

Thanks you for clear explanations of generic frame which absolutely has sence! I loved how you emphasized focal points, I think you are both great teachers with real and great practical background. I am landscape artists with medical background: http://www.zufar.com. I feel my life has meaning if I help people. I am trying to find model of grow for art enthusiasts. I paint, and won number of national level awards at Plein Air competitions, I have my name in art magazines and newspapers. And this is all on level of hobby. I see many people interested in way of not just visual enjoyment of art, but they want to create. And once your skills grow you want to show your art, teach your kids or grandkids, connect to other people. So my idea to make all this path clean of all unnecessary difficulties, with focus on growing your talent. I can teach it. Thank you again Clay and Pat!

Mark

Clay – awesome podcast man. Great content, and love the rules that you laid out. I teach online guitar lessons, use Facebook to generate leads, and have an email list of around 2800 subs. I’m focusing on YouTube tutorials for the moment to build credibility and haven’t got a blog or website up yet, but use lead pages for everything! Hoping to continue to build the brand through song lessons and tutorials to boost my engagement level with the audience and then will put out an online course of some kind. Kinda feel like I’m just stepping on Ladder Rung #1 right now, but am excited about what the future holds!

Pierre D

Clay and Pat – UNBELIEVABLE! Thanks for the excessive value and guidance offered up on this podcast.

I’m currently in the intro phase to launching my concept, http://www.cocktailskills.com. The Cocktailskills.com is dedicated to supporting helping anyone acquire fundamental skills to make awesome, balanced cocktails.

As I transition from intro to rung one, how frequently should I put out new content?

I’d love to commit to something aggressive, but want to be realistic about what I can sustain over time 🙂

cakesson

Great podcast. Good timing for me. I do not yet have MVA. I make video games for a living and I will focus on Tech Art because that is what I am really passionate about. The home for this particular niche is http://www.LearnCreateGame.com/TechArt with a hope to focus on other areas within game development in the future.

I want to start by providing lots of value to people interested in this field and I need to start building my list. What I have started doing is writing a blog post around a video capture that is on YouTube. I feel that I need to have a video in my blog post going forward. Does that break the 1 rule?

Thanks for a great podcast!

Erik K. Johnson

Clay & Pat … fantastic content. This focus is just what I needed. I have been chasing too many rabbits. This content puts it all in a perfect, streamlined form. Love it.

My one traffic source will be content marketing. My one conversion mechanism will be a sales page.

My question comes with my content marketing. Coaching is my passion. I have Podcast Talent Coach up and running with 500 people on my list. I create a weekly podcast to help podcasters. Should I find various ways to market that content or focus on one way?

Brent Mayes

Clay and Pat:
This was my top 3 favorite episode of all time! The content was focused on exactly my need.
I had been struggling with idea, products, and strategies, but the three ladder rungs allowed me to put everything into perspective.
So, I’ve been serving a LIVE audience of 50-60 for five years now. I’m going to launch my first product to them later this month out of their request and desire for me to offer it.
Once I get them onboard, my business partner and I will be using Facebook to promote the product.
We will also be using a Word Press site (GenerationsRising.com) to host blogs around this product.
Very excited to move forward after taking so many notes from this episode. Cannot wait to impact my audience with the amount of value I’ll be providing both free and some paid content.
Thanks!!
Brent Mayes

Thanks for such an awesome episode! Breaking it down into the different phases and what I need to be focusing on in each phase has made it so much easier for me to pinpoint exactly what I need to do next. And what I need to do after that, and so on! I’m a total systems nut, and I’ve been going a little crazy the last couple of days because I couldn’t work out the exact system I needed, and after listening to this episode I sat down and made a plan. And I’m so excited!!

Kendric

Hi Clay and Pat. I’ve listened and bookmarked both this and episode 78. I always refer back to those while I’m building my website, and it’s been immensely helpful.

I’m currently on Rung 1 (understand how the market ticks).
– identify your passion: For me, it’s always been mentoring kids and people younger my age.
– Minimum Viable Audience: I’ve decided to focus on international high school students who are applying to colleges in the US, since they’re often underserved in this space (most focus on US high school students).

Since I literally just finished building my website, added opt-in boxes, and wrote my first epic content (SPI 214 Content marketing with Neil Patel), now I’ll start doubling down on getting 3 subscribers a day until I hit that 2,000 subscriber mark.

As I’m guilty having a monkey brain and not executing enough, this episode pretty much gives me direction in terms of what I need to accomplish in the short-to-medium term.

Thanks for putting this out there for the community! Great value as always.

Thanks for sharing! I am a newbie on ladder rung 1. This podcast really helped me to determine which goals I should be pursing. Before listening to the podcast, I was busy trying to chase down affiliates, now I can see that building my MVA is what I should be focusing on. I just went back and listened to SPI 78 and am now ready to create a resource opt-in page. Thanks again!

Corey Doohan

Wow! How can I have any questions after how well you laid out everything?! Then you offer a possibility for us to be a lifetime winner for leadpages?!

I’ll follow everything you’ve put out there, and maybe, just maybe… I might not make a successful business.
Odds are that I will though! Thank you!! 😀

I’ve ran a successful brick and mortar business for 4 years, but desperately looking to make money online. I’ve got the idea and content, just need to work on gaining that audience.

Kristina Solheim

Thank you so much for a great episode! I now have a huge list of tasks! I’m planning to focus on Instagram, because my audience is artists. I am going to have a blog on http://www.gettotheart.com but it isn’t up yet. I’m a newbie!

Sagi Barzilay

I have narrowed down on my “five ones” without knowing! Thank you for the reassurance I am on the right path 🙂
I got the one product (private programming lessons), one conversion (student qualification page — a.k.a. sales page), one traffic source (organic SEO), one traffic source (high schools in my area). So now I am down to one year to make it work and make it my ONE thing.

Thank you Clay and Pat for slapping me straight!

David Yost

Thank you Clay for providing so much great info. I have started a new blog http://www.lovemycigars.com and needed to hear hear this. I am a hard worker but I tend to chase to many squirrels so I needed to hear this.

Amanda

Thanks for all the value in the episode. Super generous! Do you have a social media strategy or is that considered a “Traffic Source”? So many people say post 3+ times per day to create value and build your audience…I use FB Ads and post fun stuff throughout the week, but I am not near 3x per day! What are your thoughts on this? I have one business that a Pinterest Ad over a year ago is still bringing in traffic daily and I have not posted on my FB page since last Fall 2016. I’m not sure if that is a fluke. I’m sure if I posted more often I’d have more engagements but it is not a money producing business.

Jenny

Thanks Pat and Clay for the great information. I can definitely suffer from monkey mind, so I appreciate focusing on one thing advice.
I don’t have my own self improvement product now so I’m going to focus on one affiliate product that I personally use and believe in.
Then, I’m going to focus on my sales page. I imagine I would put as much energy into the affiliate product as I would my own to get better conversions.
Thanks!

After listening to this, I realized that I have been doing Step 2 processes before achieving everything necessary for Step 1, out of desperation to make things work. I too think I’m like you @claycollins:disqus, when you told your story of how you hated grad school and did everything you could to get away from it. I’ve realized that I’ve never enjoyed my career and have amazingly stuck with it. So it even gets me more fired up to my commitment with my business.

>> Here’s my question: You say to stick with each rung of the ladder for at least a year. What do you suggest to someone who’s been trying new processes for almost three years and has yet to reach rung two? In my blog and business, I’ve researched, built and launched a few things a variety of ways with a few small products, but nothing has panned out. I have the traffic source optimized and a list of 1000+, yet when I create things they (supposedly) want, I find that they really don’t know what they want. And that they don’t know what they don’t know about my niche. Make sense?

Anyway, I really appreciate your influence. I’ve had my eye on Lead Pages for months now and was planning on converting over all my landing pages and optins in the next few months. You’re fantastic! Thank you for your time and expertise that you’ve shared. 🙂

Catherine Lester

Commanding Clay,
Starting out fresh, my idea for a blog that would generate a minimal viable audience is Benefit of Celebrating Corporate Milestones. I’ve created a Corporate Milestone Journal that a tool that helps companies capture their successes.
The benefits:
** It brings forth all the reasons to celebrate corporate milestones
** Successes spark employee engagement and fortify employee pride
** It’s a tool to attract bigger clients
** It’s a tool to help companies plan for the future
** It’s a tool to help companies see potential opportunities not visible before
** It’s a quick support piece for internal or external media
** It’s a foundation for an annual report

Ian Challenger

Hi there, a bit late joining in the conversation, but better late than never though eh? I loved this episode @claycollins:disqus and got a massive amount out of it. A while back I started a new Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/futurechallengers/) based around my passion of local food with the idea of starting an on-line business but initially building an audience and seeing what happened. In the meantime I have been doing consultancy to get some money. But I want the local food thing to be my business longer term.

So I have been working through this getting my thoughts together on ‘laddering up’ based on this podcast and had two questions that I wasn’t clear about from what you said during the podcast Clay. Forgive my ignorance but I wasn’t clear on what was meant by conversion mechanism and traffic source. Here’s what I think they mean, can you confirm or correct please.

So I think conversion mechanism means how traffic leads are turned into sales. So you use Webinars and promote your product offering through a bunch of free webinars. Is that correct? Do you then follow up the webinar with a more direct email pitch as well?

And I think traffic source is how you get the traffic to sign-up to your newsletter and webinars in the first place. So you mention content marketing which is what I have fallen into and this should direct people to a website with a opt-in option. Is that the correct?

Again thanks for this episode and the podcast. I’ll look forward to the next episode

Excellent episode, Clay and Pat! You pointed out a lot that I’m doing right, and a lot that I could do better. Based on your advice, I would focus on a sales page because I am most comfortable communicating in writing. Although, I’ve been experimenting with video and I’m intrigued by the the response. Thanks again you guys for the awesome information.

Kevin T

Such an insightful episode, Pat and Clay.

After listening to this episode, I realized that the number one reason that’s slowing me down is actually the thing that I thought could generate result faster – focusing on too many different offers and traffic sources.

Now I should follow the rule of five 1’s. And I’ll focus on PPC traffic.

Hey, Clay & Pat! I will be focusing on converting through Instagram. I have a good sized following there and I think it will be my best shot at converting people onto my paid products. I run a DIY & Woodworking blog and YouTube channel and sell detail plans that include 3D drawings to make my furniture and shop builds. I want to expand my product line and get into higher priced products (plans are $5, $7, and $9). I do very well with selling these plans, but want to convert on a larger ticket item. How do I test the water to get people to trade up and go from buying one plan at $9 to a hands on course for $99? Would you suggest a minimum viable product that has actual video content or just pitch the idea to my group and see their response for a “pre-order”?

Thanks for all the great wisdom!

Brad

Varghjarta

I was a medium sized Internet personality on the gaming site Twitch. Though my follows were near 6,000, my concurrent views were only ever 20-80 people concurrently. In 2 years I had over 20,000 dollars worth of subscriptions and donations… but I had a significant downturn, couldn’t sustain my simple lifestyle and I’ve all but given it up and now I’m towing the line at a job that destroys my soul. I don’t know where to go from here. Thank you.

Twitch and platforms like that are a great place to start. If you had 20K people on an email list via a service like Drip.co (which you can start for free) you’d never have to work another job again. My advice is to build an audience that you own.

cookbooks

My husband and I are JUST starting our new business together. It is, as you mentioned on the podcast, an arduous endeavor, but so fulfilling. We are planning on building our business around the blog we are in the process of creating!

Such a worthy objective. I’ll be cheering you along the way. Best of luck.

Avanti Desh

Hey Pat and Clay!

Thank you for another SMASHBOX episode Pat, and thanks to Clay for sharing all that amazing information!
This episode really encouraged me to choose ONE conversion mechanism to focus on. I must admit, I’ve been all over the shop! So I’ve chosen a landing page through Leadpages. I’ve had Leadpages for a year now and don’t think I’ve used it to it’s full potential. Today I’m sitting down and focusing on refining my copy for my opt-in Leadbox, revamping my Lead Magnet and sprucing up my Landing page, ready to meet that 2000 subscriber number!

You got me thinking about upgrading my Lead Pages account so I can get Lead Digits! I have an illustration/animation business, where I create promo videos for entrepreneurs. I think Lead Digits would be an AWESOME marketing tool for when I’m out and about trying to explain my business to people. Instead of giving them my business card, I can ask them to text and BAM – they will have my freebie + newsletter with an example of my work + Info kit!

Hey Clay and Pat! Thanks so much for a killer episode! I love listening to something where I have so much to take away and immediately put into action!

I’m a musician (specifically a euphonium player) and going down an artistic path that is sooo rare that it proves to be extremely difficult to make a full time living strictly playing the euphonium! I also have a bachelors in music education so when I jumped into the world of online business, it was a no brainer to to leverage both my skills and teach an online course around musicianship and performance!

I’m just about to start launching my webinars. I feel like having experience teaching, building a personal relationship, and then offering a course to continue the path is in perfect alignment with what I do best and what’s best for my students. Even if they don’t enroll in my course no worries. They still are able to walk away with action steps from the webinar.

I’ve been listening to your podcasts for a month now after I discovered there are so many podcasts out there for blogging. I started a blog without knowing anything about it and listening to your podcast I always learn something I can implement for my blog. I originally started my blog writing about things I enjoy and have seen discovered I can actually monetize it. I’ve decided to write an Ebook and my goal is to launch it early next year. Since it is the first product I wish to sell I want it to be amazing! And since this podcast encouraged me to choose one conversion mechanism I think the best method that fits my blog and my personality is a lead page. Again I am completely new to this and I’m just so excited I have decided to do this so I can focus all my attention on just this one method. Thank you for the podcast!http://Www.getkamfortable.com

I’m a pastor, speaker, coach, and new author and my biggest need is to build a mailing list. Currently, I’m just using free mailchimp and a free popup from privy on my squarespace site. Pretty basic. It’s not great, but I’m just getting started. My site is currently at “minimum viable product” stage. I would love to use LeadPages and probably ConvertKit when business picks up. Eventually, I think I can do some webinars and courses. We’re a nonprofit so I’m trying to keep the overhead down in the beginning. Thanks for taking the time to help us newbies get started. Blessings.

My number one conversion mechanism is the Upside Down Homepage (as coined by Bryan Harris). It allows me to make my email course the only thing that they can see on the page, and my signup conversions are awesome. I think I get around 6+% of the people coming to my page sign up for my email course, and I KNOW I can get it higher.

So I suggest removing the main menu, and only showing that in the footer and of course you can show the navigation on the sub pages. And if you do that, you certainly will see a boost in your signups. Anyway, for an example of what I did you can check out Freelancecollege.com. But there are other great examples like michaelhyatt.com/welcome, videofruit.com, and others.

Anyway, thanks again, and I will certainly listen to this podcast again.

I just started looking at all the work I have been doing and decided to focus on what actually matters (as Michael Hyatt would say, do work in my desire zone). That has already made such a huge shift in how I work. I’m more productive and able to focus on what moves me toward my goal. I also signed up for Leadpages a week ago today and I’m loving it so much!

Wow easily one of the best, if not the best podcast interview to date on SPI. So much practical and actionable information we can all use to grow our business no matter where you are. I’m one of the many ADD entrepreneurs out there who try to do too many different things at once and end up not getting anything actually done to move the needle.

For my one selling mechanism I’ll be focusing on is sending a daily email to my list. I’ve been following Ben Settle’s method to selling and it really resonates with me. I’m naturally more of an introvert who enjoys writing so I can picture myself every morning sending a daily email. I’ll also be focusing on content marketing with on SEO emphasis to keep growing my email list.

I don’t have an audience yet. I write on personal development/self-help, just like Clay when he first started out. In fact I just started this blog (http://constantrenewal.com) in March 2017. I aim to build an audience by getting a list of email subscribers.

I pair this strategy with Quora, where I can use my posts to answer questions. Because my posts are rather long, it actually answers questions in an interesting manner. If anyone wishes to use this approach, consider using Quora to answer questions and republishing them on Medium – it’s more intuitive that way.

I’m seeing great success with this strategy so far. Honestly, I think this might even replace guest posting as the main way for bloggers to gain traffic. You don’t have to write that many articles, and you retain republishing rights. I’ve pitched sites like CNBC, Enterpreneur and Business Insider these articles. So far I’ve gotten a favourable reply from CNBC for their ‘Make It’ section, but I’m confident that more sites will pick up my stuff.

I don’t have a lead magnet yet, but am creating one. I think it’s gonna be very effective especially since content like this can be syndicated on sites which allow you a byline. If I can write great copy and provide value, I’m confident it’ll send traffic to my landing page. Longer term, it’ll help SEO which also increases traffic.

I forgot about this in my original comment, but thanks for this podcast Clay! It’s great to hear from someone who has been there and done that especially since I’m where you first started out. Gives me a great roadmap for the future ahead.

Fantastic episode. I love it when I attract exactly what I need to take the next best step. I’m on step 1 focusing on teaching woman who’ve began to question their drinking how to change their relationship with alcohol one thought at a time. Because video is easier for me than writing, I’m going to use video’s. Thanks again to you both.

I’m doing YouTube right now and putting them onto my blog and Facebook Live with a “confessions on the fly”. I’m a flight attendant, so I’m tying in this life with my teaching with terms like seat belt, oxygen mask, transformation flight, journey, suitcase, etc.

Because I’m in the create your MVA phase….. I have 10 ideal subscribers right now. I listened to the webinar you did with Pat – Rapid List Building Webinar 2.0 webinar. Thanks for the awesome tips. I love knowing where to spend my limited time and focus. Attracting 3 ideal subscribers a day. Putting together my first webinar for May 4. Thanks again for @claycollins:disqus and @Pat for giving and sharing. You are right setting the date makes it happen. 🙂

Hazel Hardie

Thanks so much for this incredibly informative and helpful podcast, Pat and Clay! I’ve got so much value out of it, I’m definitely going to study the transcript several times! 🙂

My main focus will be on growing my transformation coaching business using webinars. I’ve been trying all sorts of marketing tactics, but I love your recommendation for the rule of 5 ones. That will help me focus on getting really good at webinars, and really connecting with my audience. Hopefully I won’t be on rung one for too long!

Thanks again for taking the time to provide this value. I can’t wait for your next podcast together! 🙂

There’s no better way, short of 1:1 conversations, to get to know your audience than webinars.

Maggie Bergman

Wow, you guys Rock! I’m building a jewellery making course in the form of a continuity membership. My audience hangs out of Facebook so I’m going to offer a mini course as a freebie and advertise on Facebook.
It is an easy audience to target and I can do it via my FB Page, hopefully building Likes there as well as my email list.
I think Clay might just be on the path to beat his previous record! Thank you so much, it is the kind of clarity we all need to use to move forward!

Pat & Clay, thanks so much for this jam packed episode! You are awesome, as usual. I’ve had a podcast for a year now, and have been slowly building my audience. I’ve been using Lead Pages for “freebies” to grow my list, and my strategy is to start sending a weekly email that includes an offer. Right now it’s an update about the show.

I particularly like how you tell us NOT to succumb to our natural ADD — jumping in to several things at once. I’m definitely guilty of this and will pay more attention to it so I can STOP doing it now.

I’m already a fan of LeadPages, and I hope you pick me!!!

Kathe Kline, host of the Rock Your Retirement Show (I do’n’t know why Disqus signed me in under the wrong ID, use @KatheKline if you want to tweet at me) 🙂

P.S. Don’t forgot to build that email list with something like Drip.co (which you can start for free) so that you own the relationship with your audience. Instagram is nice, but nobody should be a gatekeeper between you and your list.

Thanks for a great episode. My best conversion area is email. I write blog posts that drive traffic and give away a free checklist for subscribers. My landing pages need help though.

Thanks for the inspiration to keep on helping and serving people. I am in a space where money is not the motivation. I’m at 4k subscribers, but nowhere close to 6 figures. Maybe some day… but my biggest goal is to be able to serve more people. More money would just mean I can invest more time and resources into reaching more people.

This was an inspiring podcast guys – thanks for giving crazy value Clay and Pat. I’ve been a past Leadpages in the past – and have been in this limbo state recently with new options! So overwhelmed but really sparked my interest in Clay’s Leadpages again. In the process of launching a new site – and this couldn’t be more timely… WOW! Pat, you rock. Clay, thank you.

I have a severe case of B.A.D.D (Business A.D.D) so this advice really hit home. Thank you.

I often hear experts stress the importance of mastering video. e.g. Webinars, Live, Sales videos. The thing is, I know people who are brilliant at what they do and offer, but they’re simply not good on video. Sometimes it can even damage them because they can’t verbally express themselves in a convincing way, because they have so much knowledge in their head and they can’t articulate it in simple terms for people to understand. I have this problem.

So that being said, my conversion method I’m working on is a sales landing page that includes:
– 7 second elevator pitch
– Brief story as to how I got here
– Testimonials
– FAQs
– But But But (more FAQs)
– And ’13 Reasons Why’ this is right for you

I want to be able to prove video is not always needed, if writing is more your thing.

I’m starting a blog that helps people focus on seeing the glass half full in their lives vs. half empty from the point of view of a single parent and sole financial provider – that even though your life may be imperfect from how you envisioned it would be, you still have the power to make it a good life. I plan to have inspirational blogs, as well as tips. My goal is for readers to find the info useful, whether it’s learning to have a more optimistic view, a reminder that they already have things to be grateful for, etc. it will be a feel-good blog with real, concrete tips on things such as how to save without feeling the financial bite of replacing your broken computer. I will use affiliate marketing as my revenue, only for products that I’ve used for months or years. I’m hoping that people will want an e-book eventually that I’ll promote through email and a sales page.

I’m in the process of my building my tax and accounting website. My method of conversion is giving them absolutely everything for free, every piece of knowledge I’ve learned from 5 years of accounting. And then charge for the implementation.

Thanks for the advice on focusing on just one business, I was in the process of starting a few. I’ve now scrapped everything else to focus.

Love this approach. Just remember to build your email list from day one.

Jay Kim

Hi Pat and Clay – amazing episode! Thanks so much for sharing and giving such specific timelines and metrics. This is very helpful for many of us that are stuck on Rung 1 to get to Rung 2. One quick question for you Clay, on the rule of 5 ones, you mention one product, one conversion mechanism, and one traffic source. What are the last 2 “ones”? My apologies if I missed this while listening, was too busy furiously taking notes! 🙂

I just published an ecourse on Thinkific and I need to market it. I have a blog and I’m using email currently to drive traffic to the course landing page. I’ve got an audience of 7,000 subscribers and I need to focus on turning them into buyers. I found this podcast super helpful. Thanks.

Pat & Clay – great episode. Just started using LeadPages myself after researching many platforms and I have to say it great. Love the interface, design layouts and simplicity! So when I saw this episode put up as a notification I had to listen in to the mastermind behind it all. I started my business full-time when I was 24 and now I’ve been able to build a team around me and start bringing my services to an online platform. I feel like we’re in the ladder 1 phase all over again with collecting emails and truly gaining a community. In the beginning, I didn’t niche down enough – I wanted business and I didn’t want to turn anyone away. It’s been like puling teeth to niche down as much as I have but it’s been like a weight lifted off my shoulders because I’ve been able to be incredibly focused & create my ideal client avatar. I’ve niched down to Peak Performance Coaching for Athletes, Coaches & High achieving sport teams. I help them focus on the mental performance aspects so they can better perform at the mechanics. My main online audience building platform is video – “Vlog” and Facebook Lives – and from there I offer a free download exercise for athletes and coaches and link to a lead page opt-in to collect emails and through there I do the whole email sequences and such. Also, when a coach hires me to work with their athletes I request a feedback form and am able to collect emails from both coaches & athletes and manually input them and that helps grow the audience as well. So as we move forward through this first phase the next thing I’ve been working on is an online coaching clinic to launch in August for athletic coaches to help them incorporate mental performance & personal development into their teams. I’ve noticed that a lot of new, inexperienced and/or overwhelmed coaches are looking for guidance as well. There may be a coaching clinic offered once or twice a year and from during surveys most either have to miss it because it interferes with their sport or it’s not in their city. Also most clinics focus only on the mechanics. And we know that Tony Robbins teaches – 20% mechanics 80% mindset!! But no ones teaching about mental performance to young athletes until later in the game. So get this coaches focus 24/7 on their team and are always looking at ways to get better and find the edge – but they suffer from their own personal development and coaching structure. My goal is to be a resource and support system for all our coaches out there who pour so much time into young aspiring athletes. So that’s the product/offer is an online 24/7 coaching clinic for athletic mental performance. The Conversion & Traffic platform would be FB ads because it seems that’s where a lot of my audience hangs out and that call to action would then direct them to a LeadPage sales funnel w/videos and testimonials of my results with multiple call to actions. My goal is to help 500 new athletic coaches (preferably high school level) within the course of a year during ladder 2 so that they can in turn affect the lives of young athletes on the power of mindset and in turn, that will allow the younger generation to think at new heights in all aspects of life! Clay – we use your product every day and it would be amazing to utilize your platform to reach even more lives in the future! Thanks again guys!

Trevor J. Wilson

Good stuff! I’m finishing up the first draft of an ebook I’ll be offering for sale on my site in the next month or two, and I haven’t really considered how to market it yet. But you’ve given me some good food for thought. I’ll probably either market through my youtube channel or my Instagram account, or maybe both (even if it means breaking the Rule of Ones). I’m not much of a salesman, but I’ve had enough folks asking me when I’m going to write a book to know that the demand is there. So, if you have the time, my question is this: How do you determine a pricing strategy? I know most ebooks go for a couple bucks or so, but this one is approaching 300 manuscript pages — not sure I’d be okay with selling it at such a low price. I know low prices turn a higher volume, but that’d be seriously undervaluing the unique content I’ll be providing. I appreciate any thoughts either of you might care to share. Cheers!

Hi Clay, I’ve got just over 1000 subscribers to my email list. I know that’s not the 2000 suggested, but I’ll be honest — I’ve put in zero effort to building my list. I’ve offered no freebies for signing up, and even the sign up box doesn’t show on the homepage — folks have to dig a bit to find it. Amateur stuff, I know. But the scope of this book was originally much smaller and I was just gonna sell it for cheap (or use it as a list builder) without intending that it be a serious source of income. I didn’t think it would turn into the year-long beast of a project that it has become. So plans change.

Awesome. Clay made so much sense. It was a rude awakening about the time frame. I always think things happen yesterday ? I’ve been a follower of SPI for a long time. Love your shows! I have tried quite a few that have grounded me. Thanks so much!

Hah fast reply, thanks man! Miss you guys too hope everyone is doing well. Oh yea I downloaded them all and going through them now. Seriously gold in here, I hope everyone truly understands what you gave here. People are charging for stuff not even 10% as good as this. Thanks again.

It’s true I’ve paid thousands for other stuff that you out did in a 1 hour podcast. Definitely will let you know if I am ever in MN! Look forward to making it to Converted as well. Looks like the next one is in October this year, let me see what I can arrange to be there.

krissy schamber

Hi! Great episode. I loved it & shared it with colleagues. Clay, how do you recommend getting to the 2000 followers? Using a leadpage or starting a blog (I dislike writing – this is why I question the best method)? This step was kind of breezed through in the interview, I thought, as someone starting out. I’m an architect & designer, passionate about design, and am excited to employ these methods tonight (starting with your worksheets). Thanks for the good work and help!

Danielle

I seem to get most attention and traffic from Facebook, but I have to be honest it’s not my favorite platform. For my niche, it’s so crowded. Should I force myself to like Facebook if that’s where the customers are?

I’m a visual artist and I want to create an online course. I plan to use a sales page for conversions.

Because of my business A.D.D I can’t seem to focus on anything so I’m thankful to you Clay and Pat for sharing this information. I took notes during the podcast and I’m starting the write out my plan. I’m hopeful. Thanks again!

Oliver Odgaard

This was amazing, thanks Clay and Pat. My blog is just about to start up. I’m going to send people to my website with Youtube content, and convert them into email signups through an irresistible free thing.

No, just bought a course on crowdfunding though and read a couple blog posts.

Russell Lundberg

Phenomenal value! The Lists, the rules, the Commandments! I’m still at Rung 1, after starting with Pat’s list-building video series. So inspirational and educational. https://bangkokbeachtelecom.com is pivoting to help Telecoms & ICT Professionals build their careers. Primary traffic source is LinkedIn.

Thanks for such valuable information! I am sending this podcast to a friend – we are starting to create content together so that we can support each other through this process. I already had plans to create more online courses later this year because if I’m honest, this is the part that I am most confident about. But I bow to your wisdom and will stick to one until I rise up that ladder! I suspect the ‘getting obsessed’ part won’t be a problem, though. Cheers!

Fabulous! I am beginning to build a list too, but have just realised that although my face-to-face clients could benefit from my online product (since it is a continuation of the service that I provide in person) I have not yet established whether they or similar people would actually use an online version. I imagine there is a difference. Interesting challenge…

I enjoyed it very much. I especially love the focus on “Building Minimum Viable Audience (MVA)” first! I learnt it the hard way, lol…I have started a side project since Jan 2017 which I am passionate about and still some way to reach the MVA, only around 200 in my list. I mail them 2-3 times weekly and able to generate 50-70 clicks to check out my content (I blog 2 times weekly).

I am planning to start conversion process with a webinar because I think it is the best way to engage the audience (apart from 1-1 consulting). Also, I will start practicing to perfect the webinar before I turn it to an auto-webinar. That will free up a lot of my time with a converting auto-webinar and I will be able to start some paid traffic.

The topic I’m creating a minimal viable audience around is on self-publishing a book and the conversion mechanism I will focus on is a salespage because if it’s good (the copy, design, and offer), then I’ll have a steady stream of customers without having to do repeated work to capture buyers.

Thanks Pat for bringing Clay back and Thanks to Clay for providing so much information for free. I am in Pat’s Smart from scratch class and just got introduced to SPI 78 by another classmate who was critiquing my new (blog) and told me to listen to your advice on that episode. So I just finished listening to episode 78. Now we have more golden info in this episode.

Since I am just starting out, I also use Rapidology (which is a free gift from Leadpages-thanks for that for beginners like us who can’t invest too much initially). I am so impressed with the free stuff in Rapidology that when I actually start making $, I will invest in Leadpages. My site is currently about teaching free basics of Structural engineering to young engineers and wannnabe engineers and in future providing continuing education courses (for cost) to other engineers.

Right now my subscribers are just my husband and myself ;-). Baby steps. I am building my blog. My plan to build subscribers is through offering optins in exchange for free reference materials I have used a lot during my career. I just put my reference list today after listening to episode 78.

And my thoughts on turning subscribers into buyers is probably through free webinars that will introduce them to the paid course. That is the direction that I am heading. Not sure how it will work out. Will wait to see. I also love Pat’s tip on Just in time learning to not get overwhelmed with all the free stuff available online.

Thanks a lot to both of you for helping with so much free info. Appreciate it.

So glad to have you as a student, RG! Thanks for listening, and best of luck.

Fei-Ling Tseng

I think I broke the 15s rewind button several times during this podcast – so much quality content compressed in bite-size and memorable chunks! Thank you both for sharing your expertise so freely with all of us listeners.
I’m at square one and I can’t wait to get started blogging… I appreciate the many parts where you emphasized the “serving your audience” aspect of this all. It is/was a great reminder for me which tells me to just start creating interesting and valuable stuff without giving in to my fear… fear that the topic I’ll be writing about won’t produce any good products or services that are attractive or salable. I want to write about living, acting and consuming ethically in cities.

Thank you for your thoughtful podcast. I thoroughly enjoyed the actionable and succinct advice you’ve provided.

Ironically, I seem to have the opposite problem of getting subscribers. I did Rung One by accident (writing about a niche I love and accumulating readers who also shared my passion.) It’s been so effective that for the last year I’ve had to constantly ‘cull’ my mailchimp list from less active subscribers to stay under the 50k limit so as to still be able to send unlimited emails without paying more money.

It’s only recently we started selling a couple of ebooks, compilations of the best posts, just to help pay off the expenses. You’re both right in that feeling of not wanting to ”sell out”, especially in my niche (spiritual growth), it’s quite prevalent.

But thanks to your helpful advice, I realize it’s a de-service to myself (as I juggle my other job alongside this website) and our audience not to scale properly and create the financial freedom to dedicate more attention to offering even more value to our readers.

I’m going to concentrate on Rung Two, creating more products!

To answer your question, the Conversion Mechanism I want to try is using Tests alongside Email Sequences. I’ve had success in the past with quizzes but I’ve already spoken with a developer who can make something more custom for our work.

Thanks for everything guys!

Latisha Grady

Hi @claycollins:disqus. First of all may God bless and favor you and Pat for being SOOO DIFFERENT from the online marketing pack in terms of the value you bring. You echo’d many of my concerns as I observe “coaches” and “courses” being thrown together motivated 1st my “monetizing” their audience. You guys are my model and I rarely listen to any others. That said, I need you to briefly define content marketing for me. For, I’m leaning toward content marketing being my 1 traffic source. But I’m inclined to think that part of my “marketing of the content” would involve buying PPC ads (specifically FB/IG ads) to distribute that content? Am I wrong? For isn’t “content marketing” using such to distribute (market) the content? Please clarify.

It’s the very first one, it’s not clear that they’re the ones mentioned in the podcast.

Adam Jordan

Clay – I loved the podcast. I also had to laugh about all the times you mentioned ‘Don’t be ADD’ because… I am also ADD and I have been jumping around all sorts of projects and traffic sources so you caught me haha,

So my traffic source I will be focusing on will be YouTube.

Thanks Clay and Pat

Ayoola John

Pat and Clay,

This podcast was great! I am currently working on bringing an audience engagement software to market. I love the idea of sticking to one conversion mechanism and I plan to do just that.

Since I don’t have an audience yet, I am considering Eventbrite as my conversion mechanism. I assume my audience (event organizers) reside there.

Clay!!! Amazing. Simply amazing. Compact and to the point. Actionable advice. Thanks for laying it out in such a digestable format.

So my one traffic source is going to be Affiliates / Partnerships. Luckily my sister is a bigger name in the blogging industry and it just makes sense to work with her audience who has already expressed a need for great legal information and products. I have also done legal work for some other big names in the online entrepreneur industry. So reaching out and creating great guest posts with affiliate links is going to be the best path for me. Thanks again! :))

Nigel Wright

Thanks Pat and Clay for explaining such a concise and well thought out plan, on the podcast. The realistic timescales are really helpful. There are so many people telling you how quickly you can quit your job etc, but you have to take time to learn and to build a strong foundation. I also like the point about focusing on one product/channel etc, while you are on the 2nd rung. I have found it so easy to get overwhelmed with all the different things you think you should be doing.

One thing that has always impressed me with the Leadpages organization is that you seem to have hired specialists for certain roles as you built your marketing team. I would be interested to know how you went about deciding what skill you needed at what time and also how you get everyone working as a unit when they each appear to have their own very specific role and skill set. I think this would be useful for anyone trying to build a marketing team or maybe who is deciding which tasks to outsource.

I had several Oh Damn! moments during this episode. The biggest one is what I will be implementing this week. I will convert members of my Men of Abundance Podcast audience into buyers by giving them exactly what a few of them have already been asking for, one-on-one consultation/coaching.

I’m going to use that one because this is the lowest hanging fruit because and as I said, that’s what a few of them have been asking for. And as Shane Sams always says, “if you can find one you can find 100. If you can find 5 you can find 500.” I want to provide amazing value and get compensated for my time and knowledge.

That being said, not only is Tim Paige the intro and outro voice of my show, he’s also episode 029. We talked about LeadPages during the show. I have been itching to get a product so I had a reason to start using LeadPages.

I think this is a great topic. This is so similar to what I call Laddering Your Success which is a college readiness program that I am developing. The word needs to spread!

Andre

Pat’s advice is great and all. Really. But everyone should be aware that being successful solely by teaching others how to be successful is a clever recursive business model that won’t work for more than a very few people. In a way it has something of a pyramid scheme to it. The unique “niche” everyone is craving for will most likely not turn into a seven-figure business, unless you are willing to give up that “passive” dream and start a real business, which is hard work. That said, I have much respect for what Pat does. Just be realistic.

Festus Amoye

I agree. That’s why I started a real business in a different space using another passion and skill set. The problem that I think I am experiencing is not going as far as fast.

It’s amazing how aggresively you’ve built your business (leadpages). Of course, the main reason for success was your execution – filling a huge void with excellent product. Thanks for sharing your story and inspiring us all.

Pete Williams

Thanks for a very informative episode guys.

I’m going to focus on video for my conversion mechanism because I believe it allows you to connect with your audience on a more personal level. Having that personal connection helps to build trust and when someone trusts you, they’re more likely to buy from you when you promote a product.

This is a great episode! Thank you Pat and Clay! I just listened once, and I’m going to listen to it probably at least one more time. There was a LOT of great information you shared. So, you asked for which conversion mechanism we are focusing on. That’s a great question. I hadn’t yet figured this out for myself. I’m vacillating between webinars and a sales page, using FB ads to generate leads. My audience is worldwide, so I won’t be phoning people. Thank you again!!

Hello Pat,
Just an awesome podcast you shared. I followed smart passive income blogs last 3 years, that’s why I noticed that your earning and reputation increasing day by day. Recently I launched a blog http://bloggingadvise.com/best-free-blogging-platform/ . Also, I check my mail for your news later and i follow it seriously. Thanks again for the nice one.

Thanks for the great episode with Pat. I virtually take K-5 students around the world via live, online shows (aka, Virtual Field Trips) to places like Komodo Island, the ancient world of Maya, and to Angkor Wat to name a few. Currently, with talk over 16,000 students around the world each school semester. You can check it out at http://www.learnaroundtheworld.com

It’s been tricky because I can get in front of teachers, but they don’t control funding in education. So I think I will focus on direct calls to school administrators for my conversion method going forward. What do you think? Are you familiar with the public school education market?

I’m in edtech too. I love your program! I live between Thailand and Oregon State. I have to do direct calls as well as send out press kits to my market: (AP High School, PREMED, Nursing) I think you would benefit by doing webinars via leadpages, and perhaps create CTA’s for your program? I really love what you do! Well done! @travenmeyers

Thanks @travenmeyers:disqus! Great ideas, I’ve been considering webinars to introduce our program. It would be pretty easy as I’m already running webinars to deliver our program. Are you in Thailand now? If so, I hope you had a great Songkran!

Tenesha Bagot

Hey, fantastic episode, loads of value thanks so much.
I’m starting out here with online business and the Topic of my blog that will help me generate my MVA will be in the fitness niche but I’ll be doing this in French and targeting people from France since I live here. I also already know the conversion method I’ll focus on videos because I am more comfortable speaking French than writing it.
Thanks again this episode was a massive boost in the right direction.

Hi Clay – amazing “course” you shared with us here on the Podcast. Thank you.

I’ve been someone who has studied online businesses for 4+ years before stepping up to the plate and deciding to “turn pro” and make it happen. I chose an “online course model” for my passion niche, and used a lot of paid traffic early on to validate what I was doing.

I started with paid traffic from Facebook to a landing page and lead magnet, and got my list up to 100 in the first month.

From there I decided to monetize with a small course that scratched my own itch. Sold it for $10 in month 2, and made 5 sales. Cool I thought, but still not profitable, so I upgraded the course and continued finding my best source of customers who converted.

Discovered webinars and fell in love with selling thru the platform, and have been selling course for $47 on a weekly webinar, all while tracking my cost per registrant and profit per registrant.

Thanks for the great episode, Pat & Clay! Following the “Rule of Five Ones”: I have one product (a language learning course), one conversion mechanism (sales page) and one traffic source (SEO).

The problem is that though I have a good opt in conversion rate and a substantial list size, most of my subscribers are kids/in countries without PayPal and they end up not buying. What would you advise?

Clay, I think you have smashed your goal out the park with this episode! Thank you for delivering SO much value!

The conversion mechanism I’m going to focus on is video because most of the major social media platforms are pushing both native and live video. I started a YouTube Channel and blog last year and my YouTube Channel received 100 times more engagement than my blog within a couple of months. I have an opt-in form on my blog but I have less than 100 subscribers at the moment so I will improve that and reach 2k within the next 3 – 6 months! My niche and passion is helping people who have an interest in real estate investing and being a landlord. I have already placed the Laddering Up Checklist above my desk 🙂

Hey Clay, thank you very much for the great value here.
I was always wondering in 7 day startup land how I could accomplish this. Without a list anyway. So I totally agree with your approach of “List First” or MVA. Thanks for the encouragement.
Now on to converting mechanisms: How would you go about it with blogging. I don’t really see a mechanism here other than a CTA at the end of a post. Otherwise I would definitely go with Webinars.
I believe having someone answering my most pressing question on a topic is an awesome way to give an audience member confidence in buying a product.

Steffan Jepsen

Hi, Loved the episode! I haven’t started a business yet and therefore haven’t got an audience, but would like to use sales pages to convert leads into customers. I’m an introvert and therefore writing comes more natural to me. Keep up the good work both of you!

First off, thank you Clay for that free course! Lol. That was totally an audio course. Made a whole lot of sense. I just started working on building my email list not long ago, so I only have about 200 subscribers. But then after listening to this episode, I went and listened to Episode 78 and it blew my mind!

After listening to that episode, I chose a resource blog post I made months ago that gets a lot of traffic and began working on turning it into a resource lead magnet. Anyhow, I’m all excited to begin implementing what I learned in that episode and I’ve stored this episode in my Evernote to go back and listen to this one again once I’ve reached 2,000 subscribers.

I’m a photographer and my audience is photographers. Specifically, photographers who are just starting out their businesses and don’t know where to start. Last year, I tried focusing on just blogging for targeting them, but it wasn’t working so well. So, I went out of my comfort zone and started a YouTube channel a few months ago and just focused on videos. The result was much better. I even started getting random emails from viewers saying how beneficial it is. It’s even given me topics they want to hear about which makes it easier for me to create videos off of. Currently, I only have almost 400 subscribers on YouTube, so I want to begin converting them into email subscribers. Which after listening to Episode 78, I can now do!

So, I feel I’m off to a great start since I’ve only been focusing on YouTube. It’s going to be my one conversion mechanism! As much as I’d love to win a lifetime subscription to LeadPages, I feel I’ve already won because of all the value I just got from both episodes. Thank you Pat and Clay for being so giving!

Damn Clay, so much of this resonated. I keep trying to reign in that entrepreneurial ADD you speak of. I’m 29 and working on my first solo venture, on rung #2 and this is the clearest business building lesson I’ve heard. I feel like I just sat down and scored a complete roadmap in an hour. My conversion mechanism has to be webinars, it’s where I’ve always been best. That’s what I’m choosing to run with. Thanks SO much!!

Definitely inspired by this episode. Just getting started with building an audience and hoping this is the year of change for me. Looking forward to learning more from both of you guys. Keep up the amazing work!

Lincoln Barros

Hey Pat & Clay!

Thanks for a ripper of a podcast. Definitely spoke to me in volumes. So guilty of having some success and then spending money on the next course or tool to help me 10x my business but I get lost in the learning or configuring and not in the doing. I know I need to do a deep dive on my business. It’s time to deliver extreme value to a wider audience.

To answer your question, my area of focus is within transformational fitness. This is where I help clients on how to use the transformation of their body to be the catalyst to transform their lives. They learn if they can change their body they can also create change within their lives mentally, socially or financially.

I am focusing on using blogging as my platform to reach my audience. Using Facebook as my means of creating targeted traffic to a lead capture page which will deliver them free, value added content that will help them reach their fitness goals faster to create change within their bodies for life. This would be the way that I enter into the conversation with them on what they need to create change in other areas of their lives.

Thanks again for an awesome podcast!

Travis Haines

AWESOME SESSION!!! I am brand new to this space and am very much reaching for rung 1 right now. I have heard it many times before but you really hit home the practicality of taking steps to achieve the big picture. I am heading over to Session 78 right now!

I am starting a blog and haven’t really been able to figure out how to build an audience. I find my introverted personality gets in the way. But with that aside, I wanted to get into audio via podcasting, anchor etc. And then when I am comfortable, move to video. It scares me a bit but I feel it will work if I can break out of my shell. Audio and video is far more personal than a blog post and I feel it will make a far bigger impact with those two mediums.

Thanks Again for the Session!!!

Phillip

WOW! Thanks so much for this course Clay! This really opened my eyes as I was stuck thinking I needed more products when really what I need to focus on is more traffic and true fans.

So I am going to focus now on actually building my audience by giving away a lot of free and helpful info through blogs and videos with the mindset of helping people and giving real value while I build their trust.

I have so much to consider, but now I have a clear road map!

Again, thank you so much!

CTJohnson

I have heard you talk about lead pages in the past and it always interested me. I generally don’t comment, but a chance to get lead pages enticed me :P.

I have a blog site that I have put together and am just in the stages of mapping out the material I want to write about. I have a theme and my purpose is just to help people. However, I realize that along the way that I could probably turn it into a business.

The podcast was great because I was feeling overwhelmed by wanting to write the posts, make videos to go along with the posts, and a bunch of other ideas. After the podcast…I think I will just focus on the writing posts and then once that is going well, and I learn the ins and outs, then maybe add other things.

Thanks Pat for all you do and I really enjoy your podcast.

Clint Johnson

shields1

Hello Pat and Clay
This was one of the best most informative podcast I been on. This is what I call giving Value and and truly Serving, I thank you guys so much for all the information you provided. This is truly what I needed to get a grounded foundation for creating my business. I am re-accessing my approach to follow your steps, and get out of this stuck rut I been in. (letting go of the ADD). I can see clearly now!!

I don’t have a list yet but that’s about to change now. I will be using blog for my conversion source.
Thankful and excited!!

L. Shields

Jose Carlos Montilla

Hey Clay and Pat!

That was a HUGE one. Thank you very much for such a great session guys.

I’m more excited than ever with my online business and, even though I’m still in rung 2, it seems like I’m on the right track.

I have already created from the ground a subscriber list of around 3,700 people (in 4 months). Also, I have launched my very first product with a conversion rate of 0.85%. Which I find pretty standard, is not it?

What I’ve found to be really interesting is the rule of five ones, since it’s REALLY simple to get distracted by the enormous amount of possibilities that are out there. Trust me, I was feeling confused these days but your advice made me get focused again 🙂

Could you use this for ecommerce?lets say for a t-shirt or clothing online store?

Nancy

I especially enjoyed the bit about the “ADD” because I am just getting started. Thanks for the reminder of focus on one thing at a time. I think my one conversion is going to be content through my blog.

Ajaya Joseph

I have a Facebook page with over 60,000 followers. My challenge is converting these into an email list. I collect leads via the sumome list buider plugin. Right now, I’ve only been able to collect 144 leads, mostly due to me not posting enough content to my website, which then gets shared on Facebook. Clay, any suggestions on how I can increase signups to my email list without any products? My call to action is: “Sign up to be notified when new videos are added to the website”.
Also, how can I incorporate Leadpages into my overall strategy?

corra

Really great podcast, I enjoyed it a lot, am just starting out with a German language school, as I am an introvert (I am not teaching, my partner is), I will be focusing on landing pages and ppc campgains.

Barrington Lewis

Nice episode gentlemen. I use blogging/writing strategies to generate followers. I’ve been blogging for about 6yrs without many subscribers although my site has had 60K views since I started blogging – but no one really subscribes?? I’m not sure if leadpages would help me or if I should change course and find something else I’m passionate about…which I think would be difficult. If anything, I’m really passionate about finding income given that I’ve recently been laid off. So I’m very passionate about becoming an entrepreneur and never having to be in this situation again 😉 .

I don’t want to sound negative – just sharing! Thanks for the episode – I’ll at least know what to do to generate followers and “ladder up” once I find what I could offer to help others!

Pietro

Thank you Pat and Clay! Amazing episode. I love the idea of the one conversion mechanism! For me it’s VIDEO. I’m a screenwriter and editor, I’d like to use my producing and editing skills to create videos about screenwriting. Starting a YouTube channel and sending videos to my list.

I think I’m not ready to take the first step because my income doesn’t allow me to focus on this new journey. I have a stable and I’m working hard on my video producing and editing freelance business. I’m a big believer of “The One Thing”, my plan is now to focus a lot on getting a stable income with video editing and producing. After saving 3-6 months of expensive I would start climbing the ladder by producing YouTube videos sharing value about screenwriting.

— Do you see any alternatives to this approach? Is there anyone else struggling with the same problem? I’d love to read your experiences.

Great episode! My main coversion method will be writing highly share-able blog posts. I’m an alternative fitness blogger, and I noticed my hand balancing articles get shared organically in this large FB group dedicated to this subject. It seems to be my 80/20 as far as interest and following compared to other topics I write about. Pretty far from 2k followers, but hoping more attractive opt in offers will help!

Pat & Clay – I Sincerely thank you so much of laying this out in a simple to digest and actionable step by step.

I am personally motivated and passionate to put a end to crappy work places, cultures and leadership that crush individual spirit, creativity and skills. My goal is to serve people to empower them with clarity, purpose and inspiration to make work great for all of us.

Today, I am starting out on Rung 1 to build a MVA. With email list size zero. And my goal will be to build a list of 2K in next 3-4 months.

Question for Clay:
* What are best mechanisms/techniques to drive leads from social media posts to help with email list building? (it appears other folks seems to be asking similar questions e.g., folks seems to have views on youtube, instagram followers etc.. but have a challenge getting them to subscribe to their list) — any advice will help me and others here.

Thanks for inspiring me to take action.

Will Chou

This is an interesting episode. Thanks Clay and Pat. For me, I have ~1300 subscribers of personal development fans but based on their emails, their problems are broad (I wasn’t as niche as I should have been — I couldn’t resist). Right now, I’m not making money from them, I just don’t think the quality of my list and specificity of the list is enough yet.

Jon Brooks

Loved this podcast! Thanks Clay and Pat. I have a personal development/lifehacking blog that’s done very well so far. I have 28 articles but have generated 2 million page views, have 5,000 email subscribers, and have been featured on many other big blogs. However, right now I’m making barely any money from the blog. After listening to your podcast, I will start collecting an interest email list for a video course I’ll create. As the list grows I can perfect my course and write more SEO-rich articles on themes related to the course. This should take me to 2K a month.

Cassie Thompson

My target audience is recent grads -30 year olds looking for career and job search advice. My main way to grow my audience will be videos, but I also have a lead magnet and a series of emails ready to go!

Mike McGovern Jr

Pat & Clay,
Thank You for sharing such great information. I really appreciate it and I have gained a lot of value from it. the biggest problem I have had is trying to focus on one thing because I am so passionate about a lot of different items. I have just now have narrowed down my goal. I have a local Facebook group that has about 500 followers but at the moment that is all and it is a local group.
When you say to get 2,000 subscribers is that an email list or is that how many people who would register on my website that I will create? I plan on utilizing these local sources to expand with a blog and forum for my website. I plan on giving quality information that I will fit to my target audience. Thank You again!

Kudos to @Pat Flynn & @claycollins:disqus for putting together this beast of a teaching. I know everyone got something out of it.

This episode came at the perfect time as I am just starting to launch my conversion mechanism and this helped me to focus my attention on one in specific and put the others on the back-burner.

My plan is to create helpful tutorial content for many things that creatives, entrepreneurs and leaders face most often in their business. By sharing these tutorials via Social, we aim to provide as much value up front as possible. I will then have a path for those who subscribe to follow (via Drip.co ? ) where we will invite them to a part of our exclusive group hosted on Patreon.

On the Patreon page we will have multiple reward tiers people can claim based off of how much they support each time we create a new piece of content. We plan to keep these tiers at a low price-point initially, we are just trying to cultivate a community of micro-supporters who really enjoy our content.

We will then use this exclusive community to get feedback from people who are already paying us for the content we produce on a regular basis. The problems, pains and needs we unearth will then be used to validate the products that we have in mind to bring to life.

I’m really excited to get this going and would love to hear your feedback!
(Hope that lifetime membership of LeadPages is still up for grabs too!) #MayTheBestFanWin

Jeff

Thanks very much to Pat and @claycollins:disqus Clay for the great episode, and insight into the foundational steps to building a successful online business!

The model for the project that I’m working to launch in May is a bit different. We’ll be generating content in the form of video reviews, on consumable products, in a particular niche. The short term goal is to leverage Amazon’s affiliate platform, with the long term goal being direct partnership (and corresponding commissions) with the brands whose products we review.

Additionally, we’ll publish a monthly “newsletter” which will actually be more of a product specials communication, which will allow brands to offer their products to our audience at a discount. We’ll be able to monetize that newsletter both through the resulting product sales, but also (eventually) in upfront fees collected from the advertisers.

Once the audience of 2k is built, we’ll certainly look to develop a product (perhaps digital) of some sort, but we should be able to monetize more quickly, without actually “selling” due to the affiliate component of the project.

Based on the info above, would you do anything differently than you’ve described in the episode?

As indicated above, our primary plan for conversion on the site will be video.

Again, HUGE thanks for the value of what you’ve shared!

Rachel Rambach

Hi Pat and Clay! Thank you so much for this amazing episode. My two biggest conversion areas are Facebook ads and my blog (leadboxes have been a game changer!). The information you shared on this episode came at the perfect time, as I prepare to move up the ladder by stepping back from another area of my business that has been taking away my focus from my primary component. You have both reinvigorated me and gave me confidence to proceed full steam ahead! Thank you again.

My current niche is railway photography. I have a mailing list but I’m well short of the 2,000 minimum viable audience you mentioned. I worry that I’m niched down too far…

I have a few small products (e-books, videos) and in the past my conversion method has been a sales page. I find it works pretty well with the audience I have, between the rare sales pitches I give on my mailing list and on social networks and the SEO I have worked on to bring traffic to my site. I’m not comfortable yet with webinars but I have been thinking about it. It may work better as I find my audience loves video as well as photography.

Clay and Pat, Thank you very much for the podcast, best one I have heard so far. I have really just started into this online business arena and have been doing exactly what Clay said not to do in working on too many ideas and areas of the online business place and not focusing on one thing and one area of that one thing. My original niche/business idea is T-shirts, specifically for Firefighters, Military, and Police. I used to have an actual shop and printed locally, but wanted to expand into a bigger arena. I stumbled into Shopify, but am not sure that is the best platform for me to start. I am going back to the drawing board to try and just build my email list and go from there. everything you spoke about makes sense, juts trying to make it all apply to my t-shirt business idea.

My ideas right now, are to just start by offering t-shirt designs for fire/police/and military and hopefully move into physical sales of shirts. Just trying to make the right first steps and not jump too far ahead. Thanks again for everything.

Clay and Pat,.. so much gratitude. Leadpages is the one program I keep even when the finances shake beneath my feet… I’m so grateful for your wisdom, and respect you sharing the power of mindfulness and meditation. Meditation is how we as a family (young kiddos too) start our day. However, I get your points about focusing on one product, and one path. Where I hit my head against the wall, is that I have two paths. I have a completed app called Scrub Ninjas (7 apps total), the first ever video game exam review for premed, nursing and high school AP. I’m the designer, programmer and hustler for that product, (Still hustling solo). I’m unsure of how to use LP for app promotions and leads. On the other side, i’m in the middle of finishing my design course for entrepreneurs. I want to make my mark in this world matter, and teach others how to give a clear digital story, and with confidence. The funny thing is, is that i’m in the cave designing for my products and my clients, and haven’t had time to build deep meaningful relationships with my tribe. I’m also a midwife… So, you can say I have the davinci syndrome for sure.. Bottom line is, I love LP because of the design factors, the ease and consider it my go to tool for affiliate pages, yeah, I build affiliate pages out of your website style lead page.. anyhow, i’m inspired, and will download the content and worksheets you provide. Your points helped my vision, I tend to love shinny things, and spend more time creating… and supporting others vs. myself. Thanks Pat for this, always grateful. With respects, T. Raven @travenmeyers

What a great interview. Thank you Pat and Clay. I am definitely in the beginning stages and need to build a MVA. The first topic I wanted to build an audience around was “How to Speak Tech” but using the concepts in Will It Fly, there didn’t seem to be a solid audience out there. (Thanks Pat for helping me dodge some heartache there.) Now the topic I’m considering building an audience around is “DIY eCommerce Websites.” I’m in the validation phase (back to Will It Fly) principles but if it checks out, I’m taking Clay’s advice and focusing on finding and serving my first 2000 before even thinking of a product on my own. Thanks again both of you!

David A. Crabill

Such a challenge to focus in on 1 product, 1 conversion mechanism! Working on my ADHD!

Alana Alsop

I have been trying to piece together a road map for my sales product and consulting business for months. I consumed webinar after webinar looking for a plan that would get me on this ladder. I am already making a small salary per month (got my current clients by sending out emails) but I had no idea what to do next or how to scale or even how to get 1 subscriber never mind 2,000 subscribers. What an amazing podcast. I can’t believe how much I just learned! I am going to report back in 3 months and let you know that I made my MVA goal. Thanks Pat and Clay!

Andrea Hale

This is seriously the best interview I have heard in a long time!
And what a treat that it was between my 2 favorite people – Clay, I followed you for eons and was one of the early adopters of LeadPages…and Pat, I remember way back when you launched SPI and have been a true fan ever since! So thank you, both!

I love the Laddering up detailed notes and the checklist and will be sitting down this weekend to create a plan!
I have been in business for 10 years now, not per say online – more behind the scenes of my client’s successes, but I am stepping out and completely rebranding.
This information is beyond helpful, as online, I am starting from scratch – and my step one is to build an audience and following. No wonder I have been spinning my wheels a bit for the past few months, as I am trying to focus on way too much!
My biggest AHA was that even though I know marketing and implementing is easy for me, I have been doing so for clients that already had a good size following and established online businesses. So creating products, upsells, monetizing, testing, automated webinars and complicated sales funnels….was easy.

My own business, especially going online and rebranding is NOT at this stage, so implementing what I have done for clients for years is not going to work, at least to start with, and I would be spinning my wheels focusing on the wrong things. I love your rungs, outlines and focus points.
This has helped me clarify things I need to focus on to ‘replace’ my 6 figure income with my online efforts.
Thank you both for this interview, and everything you do!

Will Chou

My one conversion mechanism: guest posts to landing page opt in.
For sales: it’d be a sales page because I am better at writing. Maybe I’ll throw in a video because I’m fine with video too, just not in person selling or on the phone.

My target audience: Ideally, it would be high performers like Flynn, Clay, Bruson, Patel, Sethi, etc. who love to learn more about personal development. But that’s hard to do so I am currently just attracting anyone interested in personal development — lately, a lot of young students are opting in. The problem is the audience is too broad and their problems are all over the place (hard to decide on one product to sell) and it’s a 1300 list but maybe only a 10% email open rate.

janzenjo

Hi Clay! Thank you for this podcast (mini-course) I took notes the entire way through – so valuable! My question: I am starting a podcast/blog for Musicians and Artists to provide them with valuable, actionable items to help them make a full-time living in the Music Industry. My motivation is due to the fact that I am a full-time Musician currently making a full-time living, I am so sick of people charging the Musician for bad information. In my experience it seems like that Musician is the first person charged and the last to make money due to an old mindset that Musicians need to be broke, like it’s some kind of rite of passage in the industry, the problem with that is that most talented Musicians quit early. They get tapped out financially they contribute to everyone else making a living in the industry and don’t know how to get really great paying gigs or sell their product. I want to show them that it’s possible and lead them in the right direction. My hang up is…eventually charging the Musician…I don’t feel good about that due to my conviction that the Musician is already over charged. So in my mind my model has to be affiliate marketing. Should I add affiliate marketing products to my blog/site before I reach ladder rung #2? In your opinion is my hang up just something that I need to get over?

Michael Van Osch

Hi Clay and Pat – thanks for the great value you’ve provided in this podcast. I’m on Rung 1 currently as I teach men how to build phenomenal marriages with their wives that will stand the test of time.
The conversion tool I’m looking to use in Rung 2 will be weekly webinars that are Q & A for men.

I’m going to add the calendly option for coaching on my site RealMenRealMarriage now as you suggest at a low price point to see if that gets some traction as well.

Thanks again guys! Cheers,
Michael

Danika Cooley

This was such a great podcast! Thank you. I’ve been really interested in adding Lead Pages to my blog, and I think this clinched it for me.

Listening to this, I’m somewhere between steps 2 and 3, but I’ve clearly missed some key points along the way which of course affects the results. I think this year what I’d like to do for conversion is really hone in on my sales pages and add sales videos to those. I know that can really affect conversion, and I think it would make the mission of my product much clearer to my users.

Torben Anderson

Thanks Clay Collins, I’m in the foundation, and close to finding the right solution in my market. Thanks for this podcast, it really has started to make me think about my focus and what to stop, to reach my goals. It will take me sometime to make final decisions, but the wheels are in motion. My mechanism right now for conversation is direct conversations, I’m considering podcasting
.

Teacher AJ

Mabuhay from Manila, Philippines, Pat and Clay!

This is my PITCH: I AM YOUR LAB RAT.

Driving home yesterday as I took in all the golden nuggets that podcast episode 78 had, I wondered if Clay had any other episode on SPI. Finding none, I went over to Lead Pages to sign up for Tim Paige’s free webinar. To my surprise today, as I took notice of Pat’s email on laddering, I couldn’t believe it!!! Another episode with Clay Collins!!! I drove home today soaking up ep. 263 and got so super excited about everything I learned! I am just so STOKED EXCITED and can’t contain it because so much from both episodes resonate with and speak to me – giving value, growing your MVA, rung one, being focused, passion for what you do, integrity! I couldn’t contain my excitement that it’s almost 1AM Manila time and I just had to write a comment here! Listening to podcast ep78, I realized I did some things right on my website and, on ep263, I feel like I found the stepping stones to the business model I intend to execute and follow. It is simple, sound and can be simulated!

To answer your questions…I am a full-time first grade teacher with a mission to help other teachers or teacher-moms like myself learn more about, and bravely try out ethical and value-laden, home-based businesses. I have tried a couple of them myself and I want to share what I learned with other teachers.

Bootstrapping my way through this, I immersed in SPI podcasts, interviewed other teachers, DIY’d my website after ep229 with Jess Catorc, beta-launched it with family in February, tweaked the website elements to some of their suggestions, and finally launched it on my personal FB page on Easter Sunday! I have so far gained 7 subscribers through Mailchimp, and 12 followers on a closed FB group I created. Do those numbers put me on rung one yet? Hahaha! I hope so!

What drives traffic to my site, for now, are my posts on FB. I am on Instagram, but I don’t see traffic to my website coming in from there yet.

For my website opt-in, I’m working on blog posts with the intention of giving freebies with every one of them, through my free resources page. Looking to the future, I think webinars are what I’ll be most comfortable doing leading up to a sale.

Take me in as a LAB RAT from Manila, Pat and Clay! PEACE!

Teachermompreneur AJ.

Joella Castillo

I am just putting together my website and my online business. This information is so on time for me. I am creating webinars on injury prevention. The first being: “10 Tips to Managing Your Low Back Pain”. This will be free and a vehicle to build my email list. My passion is to help people lead a pain-free lifestyle! My motto: “Change the world, one shoulder roll at a time!’ Thank you, so much Pat and Clay!

Manish Parks

Thank you for such an informative and engaging conversation. I am inspired to create content to help others.

Brant Huddleston

My one conversion mechanism will be video for two reasons: 1) I am targeting boomers, and they tend to watch more than listen or read (and hardly tweet at all) and 2) I am good at it.

Chris Niemeyer

Great episode, Pat! Clay, thanks for being so generous in sharing your expertise. Tons of great tips, tools and recommendations in laying out a path for all.
I’m in the final stages of launching another online company that will be an SaaS+Membership model for a specific niche. We have a large list formed so now we’re looking at the marketing tactics and offering tons of value to our audience in the coming months.
Your 5 1’s and 5 commandments helped me think through aspects of our plan and simplify more in order to stay focused. We’re aiming to use LeadPages as our main long-form sales page (thanks to my friend, Ray Edwards – copy-writing genius!) I appreciate the content you offered and know it will help so many.
Pat and Clay – keep rocking it as living intentional lives offering value and help to so many. Your impact is huge!

Jack Larkins

Hi both Pat and Clay,

I am just starting my entrepreneur journey and this as well as other podcasts has provided with me so much value. So thank you!

My blog is going to be in the self-actualisation area and I plan on sharing with people two tools I’ve used to become a hardcore self-actualiser. This is purely because it’s helped me so much in the last year I want as many people to know about it as possible because it’s changed my life.

Thank you again!

Alana Alsop

For some reason my first comment disappeared. Awesome podcast Pat and Clay. I have been consuming information like crazy looking for the information that was shared on this podcast. I can’t believe how simple and straightforward Clay made everything. I feel like I am coming out of the ADD fog and now know exactly what to concentrate on to grow my sales consulting business and online platform. Thank You, Thank You Thank You!

Jesse Shelton

Clay & Pat, this was an amazing show. Wow, such great truth. I’m just getting started. I don’t have any subscribers yet. My goal is to help the mom & pop small businesses or older generation who feel lost and overwhelmed by social media marketing. They want to be heard or make some extra money online too. So, I’m hoping to be able to give them some “training wheels”. You guys are awesome! Thanks for the tips and encouragement.

Wow! What a valuable podcast/course! I’m still definitely in the first rung, working on my MVA! The topic I’m exploring (still working on the early stages of my Will It Fly process) is spiritual disciplines. If I move forward with that I’m thinking I’ll do some sort of regular video show and, if that’s the case I’m thinking that video would be the perfect way to convert my audience, either with a video landing page or via webinar.

I’d love your feedback Pat or Clay for what you think!

(And anyone/everyone else on the topic, sound like something you might be interested in?)

Pietro

Is it a specific religion or believe system? I think that niching down to something more specific could help.

Thanks Pietro! Yes, it’ll be specifically for Christians, so building habits of prayer, scripture reading, and community, for example. I could also potentially examine popular trends such as meditation and Stoic philosophy from a Christian perspective, talking about how or if Christians should integrate these into their lives and, if so, how to do so faithfully to their beliefs.

Great Question!

Ricardo C

Guys, thank you so much for sharing your knowledge, experience and passions. It was a very inspiring and effective way to spread your work. I am sending from Brazil my best wishes for both of you. Cheers!

Michael Curtis

My primary conversion mechanism is blog posts. I work full time and find it easier to write during breaks and late at night when kids are sleeping (compared to recording video). I find blog posts easy to share widely via social media groups to target my intended audience. Every post I write has an optin at the end to optimize conversions.
Thanks for all your advice!

iram c

Hi Clay, on your worksheet, in the outline notes, for 2 c, it states to create one product/offer recommended webinars. So does that mean the webinar itself is the product/offer (like a Q/A webinar) or are you supposed to offer a product/offer after the webinar? Thanks

Tyson Davis

Man, what a great episode today! Love all the value you brought Clay.

I have loved being a loyal customer of Leadpages for a few years now. I am working right now on getting myself up to rung one with my website. My plan to convert my new followers is to use webinars and Leadpages to bring a super easy user experience for my followers to consume my content.

I am hoping to focus on building a webinar that gives so much value that my audience members will benefit from just attending but also will have a course purchase option. I’m currently helping moms learn how to build online platforms so that they can support their families at home.

Thanks again for the value in this episode and for giving me the mental mind map I need to build towards the next rung on the ladder!

Responding to Clays question:
My greatest conversion chanel is my blog. I write about photography and marketing for photographers & artists.
Second I am using a newsletter that works well, but is growing just slowly.
I am working on a Podcast too but the conversion rate on my podcast is not that good.
But I am optimistic on that 😉

@pat: I love your podcast

Norbert Figueroa

I’m not sure what to pick as I have a travel blog and people read it mostly for inspiration to travel or “how to” visit such and such place. Outside of affiliate marketing, I can’t really think of something (content wise) truly valuable that would make “aspiring travelers” to buy since they could easily find these other tips/content for free elsewhere.

Shannon Irvine

Clay and Pat – Amazing training!!! That’s what I love about both of you – you always give your communities so much value.

I’m a huge lead pages user and I love it!! I’ve used it for my non profit for a few years and am using it in my new venture!! (Ps. Shameless bribe hoping to get picked for the lifetime free account ????)

Okay here is my plan:
Build my 2k through a podcast called Epic Success (thank you Pat Flynn for helping me build that ??).
I plan to give amazing context and interviews and push that to my subscribers – work forums – all social channels. I am going to give free content away at the end of each using a lead page lead magnet to build my email list. I may or may not pay for some FB cold traffic.

My plan after 2k is to use Webinars to sell a on line interactive academy. I will offer consulting one on one until I am at the 2k (right now I am at 300 raving fans ?).

My niche is as a lifetime successful entrepreneur and mom and a Dr of Neuro-Psychology – I have integrated solutions to help momprenuers and want to be momprenuers go for their dreams and crush their goals!! I have proven new integrated life and business systems that actually helped me achieve success in LIfe and business!!

Ryan Concienne

Hello Clay and Pat, excellent episode!!! I found myself laughing and nodding to some of the comments in regards to avoiding the ADD aspects of trying to build an online marketing business. We are definitely on the 1st rung of the latter. We are planning on converting our audience by way of a video / webinar on a landing page that truly gives our audience actionable information for free.

Erik Hupje

Brilliant episode and just perfect timing for me. I’m starting a new online business aimed at Maintenance & Reliability professionals working around the world in asset intensive industries like energy, utilities etc. It’s a poorly served niche – especially in developing countries – and I aim to use my 20 years of industry experience to make a difference. I have been trying to get too many things 100% done before launching. Listening to this on my commute home I suddenly realized how by focussing on a MVA I can launch in the next couple of weeks with what I have ready and just build it out from there!

So, Thank You Clay & Pat. Just what I needed.

My first step towards the Rule of Five Ones: I will use content marketing as my primary traffic source.

It is so great to hear from Clay. My online journey started in 2009 with a recommendation from Johnny B. Truant that I check out Project Mojave from Clay, and I’ve never looked back. I am prob somewhere between ladder two and (barely) ladder three. I have an online product at $597 that sells consistently. sales pages, webinars, lead magnets, autoresponders, FB ads. Ok, maybe that is all still rung two. To step it up, I’ll look at adding a hire end 5x product, on top of my course, and look at chat bots and maybe scale up my ad spend, etc. for what is working in my current line-up. Congrats on all your success Clay, you deserve it! —Nanci

Tom Harris

Thanks Clay and Pat! This was a fantastic episode and it has really helped me focus my attention. I am in rung 1 and have been doing some of the things that I shouldn’t be doing (trying to do too much e.g Facebook ads and creating content etc). I really like the rule of five ones and has really inspired me to get really good at one thing.

I am now going to take on the challenge of growing my list to 2000 people over the next 6 months by using a landing page and content marketing.

Thanks for the great episode. I really appreciate the frankness about being slow, deliberate, and getting to understand your audience before you worry about schilling products. I am definitely in the first rung — I’ve got 300 followers on Twitter and 300 on IG and am working on course content.

How do I plan on converting audience members into buyers?
I plan on using webinars to convert because my subject is legal education for bloggers/influencers/online business owners and a big part of the job is making *me* — the attorney — not scary/boring/out-of-touch with their brand and their business vision.

My question is actually — how would you adjust the first rung online-consultation phase if you are legally prohibited from offering consulting session outside of your state (legal ethics being old-fashioned as they are)?

**Bonus question**Traditionally, legal services, much like insurance, tires, and other non-fun things are marketed on FUD (fear, uncertainty, doubt) — how can we break away from that but still connect with the real issues and real problems that face today’s modern online entrepreneur? I don’t like to scare using legal horror stories. But, let’s be real — no one buys a online collaboration contract because the .pdf comes in a fun color…

Thanks clay and pat! Such great info and I just downloaded the files. A question I have is, for someone like me whose product income is based on several ebooks, can this model work? Will I need to focus on a course or higher priced product to get to that second rung? Thanks!

Brandon Kelly

I’ve been doing some digging into developing my own blog and I believe that I would like to get into the self help industry and probably move into either webinars or sales pages.

Alison McDonald Marsh

Clay! I love Leadpages!! Thank you for it!!

✧ My number one conversion platform is Facebook. I do Facebook live once a week on my page. And then share that post with several groups in my niche, with the link to our free guide that accompanies the post. I teach Pilates instructors how to confidently teach pre and postnatal women.

✧ I am sooooo excited to share that, within the last 48 hours, I have obtained over 100 new subscribers to my list, via Leadpages, thank you very much, with a PDF guide (see pic). This is a HUGE accomplishment because:

1. The traffic has been organic. I did not pay one cent for any of these leads. Facebook gave me $10 to boost the post. That’s it.
2. This 100 subscribers in the last 48 hours joins a list of 300 that has taken me a year to obtain. I am stoked to have found a need in my niche, and am able to fulfill that need. That obsession you were talking about. That’s me and this niche!

Great session full of good information. My goal is to create conversion by offering a free small training course which would lead to a full paid course. With the tips given here I have some actionable steps.

Vincent Woodard

Hello Clay and Pat. I am a blogger at vincentwoodard.com and I think I will start focusing on YouTube videos as my number one conversation source. I think videos will help people think of my face when people think of my niche, which is helping people find spiritual answers to worldly issues. This would also grant me more access to speaking engagements and consultations.

This podcast was SUPER AWESOME and I am even more inspired to give more of myself to help other get more out of their lives. THANKS!!!! P.S I would love it if you pick me as one of the winners of the lifetime access to Leadpages 🙂 Thanks again.

Daniel Morris

I’m a freelance writer. I source business through Upwork and outreach. I am on ladder rung one. I have no email list. My plan is to gather potential client emails via my website and also would-be/growing freelancer writers’ info. Not looking ahead (too much) to rung two, so 2000 is my mark.

Thanks for sharing so much useful information. I am going to focus on getting 2K audience now. I have currently ard 1700 followers on twitter and will try to get them to website through lead magnet. My blog is in home automation area hence will try to providing deals in exchange for email address. I tried giving out free ebook but not many people are interested in it.

Great podcast! So much valuable information. My passion is nutrition and living a healthy lifestyle. Just getting started but I’m for sure going to check out Drip.co and Leadpage. Going to start creating content and use social media to get that info out there.

Matthew Walrath

Thanks for the great episode Clay & Pat. The rule of five ones is exactly what I needed to hear, at the right time. For my business nutrition coaching business at beyondmacros.com I have been spreading myself thin in terms of pursuing multiple traffic sources, planning new products, and thoughts of introducing new conversion mechanisms. I will now stick to my one flagship product (a 90-day coaching program), my one conversion mechanism (video chat meetings), and picking one traffic source is the scary part. BUT I am committing to PR outreach to develop partnerships because they have provided the largest growth in my audience in the past.

I have also found that with only 1k email audience, I was still able to build a 6-figure business because of the PR and partnerships we have, even more reason to continue pumping juice into the partnerships traffic source!! I will be taking a step back, and focusing on building our email subscriber base up to 2k, as well, to solidify our “rung 1” foundation.

Thanks again 🙂

Rich

Hi Clay and Pat, I loved this podcast. I’m a coach and stating a new business aiming for my 2000 list. I’m super stoked that by attracting more clients I can in turn help more people thrive. I’ll be focusing on JV’s for traffic and conversion via a landing page. Thanks for being so generous with your expertise, i look forward to being able to give back to the community once I get going.

Katie Lee

I’m committing to using video to convert. It’s proven to be what my audience loves the most so I’m going all in and making it my one method.

Pay and Clay, Thank you for the informative podcast and linked resources!

I tend to spread myself too thin across too many projects and am going to take your advice to focus on my favorite and narrow the scope of efforts. After setting it aside for a while, I’ve restarted my blog site, objective-investor.com, and am slowly building an email list. That puts me on the bottom rung of building a VMA.

Investing is a very crowded space, and it is hard to stand out. I am approaching it from the perspective that I have been successful as an independent, individual, “retail” investor with no Wall Street connections, and I want to share what I have learned so others can do the same. To build an audience, I am publishing brief, informative posts on investment topics targeting the new investor that wants to learn how to get started. To build awareness, I create relevant posts on Twitter (@objectvinvestor) and LinkedIn with links to my website articles. I have a very small Twitter following, but it is building gradually, and I’ve found I can build awareness by replying to people with much more Twitter clout. I have a large LinkedIn following, and have been reaching out to big names in the investment space because I am genuinely interested in forming connections with them based on mutual interests.

Once the VMA goal is achieved, I plan to use a sales page to sell digital content in the form of user guides and maybe a newsletter, later. Based on what I learned from your podcast, I will pick my favorite product and focus on that one. I was considering doing webinars in parallel after the sales page was in place, but I will focus on the one channel, per Clay’s suggestion.

Pat and Clay, I would love to get your feedback on this… As a way to both test viability for an idea and promote it, I was considering running an Indiegogo campaign to jump start it. The thought process goes like this: Build an Indiegogo campaign to describe the product deliverables and benefits, with a firm commitment when it will be delivered a specified time (a few weeks) after the campaign threshold is achieved. I was considering running demonstration webinars in parallel to build awareness of the Indiegogo campaign and get direct feedback that could influence the finished product. I think this is good idea, and having the 2K VMA to start would add to potential success. Your thoughts?

Thank you in advance for any guidance!
Tom

James Tribbitt

Pat and Clay, that was one awesome podcast! I will be re-listening to this probably more than once. You wanted to bring massive value, and you brought it! Bravo.

My name is James Tribbitt, and I am currently working 84 hours a week as a house parent supporting 10 foster kids. Though I am finally doing a job that I love, my true passion in personal finance, and I want to see individuals WIN with their money. Aim and nothing, and you will hit it every time, and I see too many people aiming for nothing and already in their 50’s and 60’s. I want to help upcoming generation avoid this mistake, and teach older generations that there is still hope for them!

My goal is to produce a minimum of 24 podcasts, before launch, in the next 1-2 months as a buffer, then continue to produce 3 podcasts a week, and provide a free ‘Field Guide to Budgeting’ from episode 1.

Questions:
1. Is it possible to get to rung two of the ladder in my current situation, when I will only have about 8-12 hours per week to produce content? Or at least close enough to substitute my current jobs income and move full time from there?
2. Should I offer my eBook on budgeting, and if so, should it be free or is it safe to charge for it from day one? I could always provide monetized value in a longer more detailed book later, or through other products such as webinars.

Thank you so much for all your hard work and experience, you make this process so obtainable, and I am ready to get to work!

– James Tribbitt

Amy Mathews-Muttwill

Hey Guys! Thanks so much for offering so much value in this AMAZING episode! It was truly one of those weeks in my early stages of my business where I have wanted to give up and throw in the towel. I have been hitting a wall with my content creation and have just felt a real lack of direction, even though I was really clear when I began this venture a few months ago. I’ve also got the whole ADD thing going on and am trying to accomplish too much within too short of a timespan, and I’m driving myself and everyone else around me NUTS! So thank you. This was timely! So timely. Needed to hear the ONE THING!

I am currently taking Amy Porterfield’s Courses That Convert course, and my online vocal course for adults is almost complete, but all I have been thinking this entire time is, “But WHERE do I get the people who will buy it??” Even though I instinctively KNOW the audience and the building of that audience has to come first and foremost, I just haven’t had time to really build and nurture the people I want to reach and the people I will need to have around come launch time. So this helped me reframe my goals a bit and although I will go ahead and finish my course content to get it organized in my brain and use it to drip and piece out for lead magnets, I will not launch the course in its entirety until I have found these 2K followers. I will stick to just building the tribe and delivering them content and even leaving my course open for editing and revision based upon what I learn about this audience. How will I do this? I already have a blog, but since my course is an online vocal course for adult singers, I plan to primarily use video to convert my audience into my email list. I recently signed up with ConvertKit per Pat’s suggestion, and I really want to integrate this and get it up and running through my YouTube channel as well. I will use methods like free mini video trainings along with pdf downloads with singing tips as well as audio files with vocal warm-ups to attract subscribers and build that relationship. Even though I have performed hundreds of times on stage in front of a live audience singing opera, video has been intimidating to me and I have resisted it as a medium. However, I really feel like video is the medium I need to primarily focus on and because of that, I have taken an online training that I will complete THIS week on how to successfully do video to promote my business. I am super excited and really hope to win a lifetime membership to LeadPages as it has been the TOP service on my list to subscribe to and start converting with!

Thank you SO much for this opportunity, guys! I’m such a huge fan of you both 🙂

xoxo

James Tribbitt

Pat and Clay, that was one awesome podcast! I will be re-listening to this probably more than once. You wanted to bring massive value, and you brought it! Bravo.

My name is James Tribbitt, and I am currently working 84 hours a week as a house parent supporting 10 foster kids. Though I am finally doing a job that I love, my true passion is in personal finance, and I want to see individuals WIN with their money. Aim at nothing, and you will hit it every time. I see too many people aiming for nothing, and already in their 50’s and 60’s. I want to help upcoming generation avoid this mistake, and teach older generations that there is still hope for them!

My goal is to produce a minimum of 24 podcasts, before launch, in the next 1-2 months as a buffer, then continue to produce 3 podcasts a week, and provide a free ‘Field Guide to Budgeting’ from episode 1.

Questions:
1. Is it possible to get to rung two of the ladder in my current situation, when I will only have about 8-12 hours per week to produce content? Or at least close enough to substitute my current jobs income and move full time from there?
2. Should I offer my eBook on budgeting, and if so, should it be free or is it safe to charge for it from day one? I could always provide monetized value in a longer more detailed book later, or through other products such as webinars.

Thank you so much for all your hard work and experience, you make this process so obtainable, and I am ready to get to work!

– James Tribbitt

Belinda Del Pesco

This podcast was the model of Generous. You’ve shared so many actionable directives, for free!, that I had to listen twice, and enlarged the awesome mind-map download to four pages so I can read the text, and scribble notes to myself in the margins. What a gift this is, and we get to listen to it as many times as we need to!

My favorite thing though was this: Always Respond. Thank you for stressing that one, and sharing your wonderful examples. The interaction with my blog readers and youtube subscribers and FB likers is the stuff that makes this whole endeavor worth something. My community is artists; watercolor painters & printmakers. Those folks have become my friends, from all over the world, and in every stage of creative growth – from re-entry after years of not touching their art, to exhibiting artists trying to get more from social media, or hurdling creative block.

I have so many things to think about, and the timing is perfect. Between my blog, Youtube and FB, I’m just under 15K followers, and I’m editing my first small video course. I’ll use your excellent worksheets to focus down on the Five Ones to flesh out a more specific plan, and your good advice will make this journey so much better. Thank you, thank you, thank you!
Belinda

Walter Eggers

Thank you Clay and Pat!

First off, I wanted you both to know that I paused your episode and took action on something I have been pondering for a while now. I offered my followers a free one-hour meet and greet Q&A just to see if there was interest. This was about 5 hours ago now and I see that there is enough interest to go through with the idea and see where it leads. Thank you both for the inspiration to take action.

I’ve been wrestling with this for some time now and I’m glad that Clay mentioned “Laddering up”. I’ve hatched a term of my own called “Ratcheting up” which is literally the exact same principle so I’m glad my collective assumption now has validity. Based on your success Clay, I am excited to apply the steps you’ve outlined as I’ve already begun and am pleased to find that I’m taking the correct action.

I’ve been on rung 1 for about a year now and have started from scratch at that time, literally. Separated, lost job, lost career, zero social presence or following and a single struggling father to a three year old – my ships were already on fire no need to burn them! So I hit the ground running and took action.

In short I started a yard service business, a podcast for recent and recovering single parents “We RAD DADS” and; most recently, a podcast production company called “Radical Sound Solutions” http://www.radicalsound.solutions (this is my Leadpage)

As you can see from the action I took earlier I am currently looking to leverage webinars, specifically masterminds at first to grow one of my businesses. I am a current Leadpages customer and looking to leverage that platform in all of my businesses.

Crazy as it may sound I envision all of these avenues to merge eventually however I will go where my path leads me. At the moment I see many struggling single dads “resort” to yard service in order to keep a roof over their children’s heads and food in their belly- I was no different but I see much opportunity here and believe I can systematize the learning curve with webinars and online courses to take struggling fathers to self sustaining blue-collar entrepreneurs so we can shape our lives around being there for our families.
In the meantime I am getting to know other single struggling fathers and interviewing successful single parents, blended families and family professionals in an attempt to showcase the do’s and dont’s; joys and opportunities of being a recently single parent. I figure, If I can survive all that, document my journey AND build a few businesses at the same time- I am unstoppable.

I have a long way to go but I am passionate about the men (and women) I am serving because I know first-hand how valuable it can be for someone under the immense pressure, worry, exhaustion and emotional stress during this time.

Needless to say today’s podcast was extremely enlightening and I’ll likely be listening to it again tomorrow. Thank you Pat and Clay for the incredible value you consistently provide.

Clay, Thanks for offering the lifetime membership to Leadpages. I can hardly wrap my head around the immense value two lucky people will receive. Sincerest thanks for your generosity.

Pat, I’m in your smart from scratch group and looking forward to taking action there as well as meeting you in person at Podcast Movement in Anaheim. I appreciate you and have learned an immense amount of crucial insight from the content you produce. Thank you is not enough good Sir!

Cheers and Stay RAD!

-Walter J. Eggers

Walter Eggers

Oh BTW Clay, your Leadpages tutorial videos are cheeky and fun as well as highly informative. EXCELLENT work putting those together!

Clay, I am going to use webinars as my one source that will help me to get to 2k subscribers. Can’t wait for this to happen!

Sally Good, Ph.D.

What a great podcast!. I have been chasing shiny objects the past few months while finishing a Kindle book on how you CAN prevent Alzheimer’s and other dementia’s.
This will turn into a teachable course so the focus of just one thing is so valuable for traffic. I love webinars so that attracts me the most and also podcasts. I can’t wait to read the transcript after listening to this podcast. Thanks so much for both your insights. Be healthy.

Great episode! I’m going to listen again from now. 🙂 Btw, MVA of 2000 in such a short time seems very hard. I’ve had only 80 since I released my first opt-in eBook in Oct 2015 (now I have two free eBooks for opt-in). Clay, do you recommend putting up a paid ad just to get email subscribers (when I have nothing to sell yet, not even work-in-progress)?

Answering to Clay’s question: The traffic source I’m using right now is webinars.

Jodi

Oh MY! I cannot THANK you enough for this podcast – I am literally just about to launch my blog about financial advice specifically for women and because I am working part time as a financial adviser & raising 2 kids thought i’d just write some helpful posts and tips and see how it goes, but NOW i have a concrete plan of what to do to take my little hobby blog to an actual income producing business and that is all because of your inspiring advice and words of wisdom Clay & Pat. My absolute focus from now until end of 2017 is to build that 2,000 subscriber list – now I know I have to work like a maniac to make it happen but I have the passion and obsession for my topic – just needed your guidance to help direct it for a purpose! THANK YOU

Amina

Thank you for this excellent episode – definitely a mini course packed into a podcast! Has definitely revitalised my fuel to prioritise my community engagement consistency, a much-needed reminder. My traffic source is paid Facebook ads funnelling into a webinar sequence. I’m just now in the early stages of rung 2, which is very exciting!! Leadpages has been a major part of my business from the beginning.

Q for Clay: How do you have time to have such a visible presence online, commenting, etc. while running your business empire? What’s the estimated time commitment you devote to engagement each day – is it a fixed time block or something you check in with whenever you get a chance? Would love to know. Thanks!!

Jason Cheong

This podcast blew my mind with so much clarity. Thank you guys!

Amy

Well, firstly I have to say this episode appeared at a creepily serendipitous time – I’ve just started using leadpages for a client (and I have noted it’s far more intuitive than Unbounce so far) and the day before this podcast was released I re-listened to your previous episode, #78, to refresh my memory on your tips – so thanks for the awesome new episode!

I’m going to use a sales page as my conversion mechanism – and hopefully include a video on it! Does this count as not being focused? I just figured I think that videos make the page more trustworthy, where you can see a real person at the other end.

I also really feel like I should be doing webinars – but am a bit too nervous right now :S so I’ll focus on the sales pages and work up the nerve to do webinars in the future!

Thanks again to you both 🙂

Ben Amos

Seriously actionable and valuable podcast Clay + Pat. Thanks.
So, I’ve been pretty firmly on rung one for the last 12 months although listening to this podcast has made me realise that I’ve really been going about things the wrong way. Since launching http://www.engagevideomarketing.com I built a list of 160 or so targeted subscribers in my niche off the back of an eBook and from there launched a beta ‘webinar delivery’ version of my course and had 10 paying members of that initial beta launch. A decent conversion ratio but I’ve since had a pretty difficult time building my audience further. After listening to this podcast I now know that building my MVA of 2000 absolutely needs to be my core focus for the next few months before going any further with my course launch and other content plans. I plan on building my list now through facebook ads driving signups to a regular webinar as I’m good at delivering these and I know they work great to deliver value and build rapport with my target market. Onwards and upwards to 2000 subs!!

Kathy O’Connell

THANK YOU, Pat & Clay, for this incredibly rich & helpful podcast. I was so impressed by all the golden nuggets of PRACTICAL, DOABLE advice – so incredibly helpful! And Clay, I hardly ever comment on even my most favorite podcast, but your heart and generosity of knowledge really touched me. Thank you. By the way, LeadPages is a solopreneur lifesaver! 🙂

Suzanna Miller

Oh my goodness, this was such a helpful framework to learn. I feel pretty bad right now after listening though. I am about to hit my one year anniversary of my blog, where I have been attempting to build an audience, and I am ashamed to admit that I only have 76 subscribers one year in! The handful of people I do have reach out and express how very helpful my information is, but because my topic is around sexuality, I think people are less inclined to sign up for an email list where they might get emails in their inbox related to a sexual topic. I don’t know. I DO know that the problem I address is so huge that you can’t throw a paper airplane without hitting a woman dealing with this stuff. The question becomes how to get them to sign up despite this reluctance. I think trust is key, which I will get to below…

I definitely already fall into the category of people passionate and obsessed with my mission, so I’m not going to give up even if you tell me right now that it probably won’t work. The message is that important to me. But, I also want to build this into a business so that my mission can be my work.

Part of my problem is that I am a single mom who also works, so everything I do takes longer than most.

But, to answer your question about the conversion strategy I will focus on, I have been torn between video and sales page. I think I am a good and persuasive writer when I take the time, and so I think I could write copy that would convert. However, I also think I come across as relatable and personable on video, and that it takes a lot of trust for someone to sign up on a topic related to sexuality. I think I am more likely to gain trust if they see and hear me speak so they know what kind of person they would be learning from. I would love feedback on this.

So my current funnel idea is:

Traffic source: Focus on content marketing as my source of traffic. I have been blogging, but I want to seque into podcasting and have been working on producing my first several episodes. I feel that my audience will again feel more trusting of me if they hear my voice. And I know that women like me like to multitask and are less likely to stop to read something than to listen to something while also washing dishes or driving to work or whatever.

Opt in: Free Video Workshop on one of the subtopics within my topic.

Minimal product: Bundle of MP3 recordings of guided meditations designed to help women along the road of sexual energy (again, going with the idea that hearing my voice might help them trust me). I’m thinking like 7 recordings bundled for maybe $9.95.

Other possible minimal product: EBook (which I have about 70% written), but my concern is the trust factor. Perhaps I put both together, the EBook with the bundle of recordings and sell together for like $38.

So back to the funnel, I offer the free video, and immediately after they opt in offer them the option of buying the bundle of recordings, or the EBook plus recordings. If they don’t, then work in the email sequence after the fact to move them toward buying.

Sorry so long-winded. This has all been on the forefront of my mind with my blog anniversary coming up this weekend. Sigh.

cindy

Clay,
Thank you for generosity & clarity… and for sharing your valuable knowledge! This was very motivating and lit a fire for me! I am just starting a blog. The general topic is “Creative Lifestyle”, targeting Women 35-55 yrs old. I plan to use videos for conversion.

Thank you Pat for serving all of us SO incredibly well. 🙂 You are mucho appreciated!!

Cindy

Ryan

Clay and Pat, this session was fantastic! Thank you for providing so much value.

I’m a copywriter and content marketer looking to grow my brand and help others do the same. Although I have a small regular client base, I have NOT focused on building my email list before (until now). Honestly, I tend to agree with Pat’s statement that a SAAS based business would be easier to scale as I progress up the ladder. However, I do see the potential of online courses and copywriting consultations as a viable means to increase revenues.

ANSWER: That being said, I think Content Marketing would be the most logical channel to grow my list. After all, it allows me to provide valuable content to my audience while showcasing my skills and talent at the same time. Admittedly, I’ve dabbled in Facebook ads in the past, but I like Clay’s idea of going “deep instead of wide.” Might be best to shelve the PPC for now.

Lastly, Clay struck a chord with me when he spoke about the ladder method being a “late-night and weekends” type of commitment. I do have a family to support – and I know we can’t perform our best with limited rest – but I need to up my game (at least in the short term) to make this goal a reality.

Thanks for the inspiration.

Cheers
Ryan Douglas

Travis Haines

GREAT SESSION!!! Loved it. I am new to the podcast and am hooked. Great value here. I am starting a blog and am wanting to move into audio via podcast, anchor app etc. Once I am comfortable and get a rhythm I might move into video also.

Julie Adkison

I can’t thank you enough for all the value provided! I am a pharmacist with a specialization in diabetes management. I’m trying to build a MVA of people newly diagnosed with type 2 diabetes so that I can help them live well despite having the disease. I’ve got a whopping 10 email subscribers, so I’m solidly on Rung 1. I plan to use content marketing to build my audience. My goal is to provide group coaching and eventually courses to equip people and get them on the path towards health. I’ve got a lot of work to do, but am much more motivated by the path you outlined. Your generosity is amazing!

susan

Thank you for your generosity! Truly inspiring. I am not selling anything–yet! I’ve started a social movement called OneGreenSmoothie as an easy way to get people to talk about and start eating more plants (you can pack a lot of plants into a green smoothie:)). The leading cause of global warming is animal agriculture, yet few people are willing to talk about getting animals out of their diets. I love the way you broke up the steps into reachable goals, I’m just wondering how I do that since I’m not actually selling anything. Should I try to sell hats or clothing or some item so that I can fun my outreach efforts? So far, I’ve been funding everything out of pocket. We are already making a difference in individual lives in terms of health improvement, but I’d like to scale it as talking to people one on one is pretty labor intensive. As rewarding as that is, not really scalable.
Thanks also for spreading the meditation love! I teach meditation to parents and kids as my “real” job. OneGreenSmoothie is my side passion project:).
Best regards,
Susan

Natasha

Thanks Pat and Clay 🙂 This is one of the best Podcasts I’ve listened to in a while. I always appreciate practical and actionable advice. This just so happened to be very timely for me as I prepare for my website launch in 2 weeks.

Right now I’m focusing on building traffic through my Instagram account, however I’m doing research to see if Pinterest would be a better funnel.

Thank you again for sharing your passion and being so generous with us, its hugely impactful.

I just bought leadpages like 3 days ago before listening to this bc Leadpages convinced me on a webinar. My question relates to the freebie giveaway. Leadpages allows you to just let them immediately download it instead of waiting for an email to receive it like I was doing. Is it more effective to let them get the immediate download then send a follow email how to make the best use of it? I’m giving away a spreadsheet btw

Rawfires

Video – more specifically YouTube will be my conversion tool. I am passionate about YouTube as a platform as well as YouTube’s community. I have small audience on YouTube but not sure if my audience with convert to sales. I am at a crossroads that may require me to start a new audience.

Hi Clay, My conversion mechanism is webinar-style video masterclasses, using Facebook Ads, and doing a weekly vlog post that goes on YouTube. I want to incorporate video in all that I do because I feel videos helps me give a more personal approach. My product is a 12 week video course. My audience is primarily women between 30-55 looking to increase health and abundance in their life by taking a more spiritual and conscious approach to daily living. I am a LP customer but if I win the free LP account I will gift it to my sister that will be using it for her online pregnancy coaching business for pre and post natal women looking to have a holistic and natural experience and have a natural-based support system in place during all pregnancy stages. As many women are scared, intimidated by doctors, and don’t have support, and would prefer to have a natural birth plan and be educated along the way. I believe she will also be using FB as her lead source, and possibly forums, and live teleclasses as her conversion mechanism. Thanks for LP’s and thanks for the great podcast session! Thank you Pat as well! namaste

Navid Goldrick

This podcast was so good and so frustrating at the same time.

My wife and I each have an online business selling informational products and we’re both in between tier 1 and tier 2. She’s at 7,000 subscribers, and I’m at 2600. It took me four years to get where we are. Business is growing, but I’m nowhere near earning $4000/month with my 2600 subscribers. Bryan Harris is in the same vein as this and according to his info, I should be able to earn way more with the number of my subscribers.

I just don’t see it happening. Out of these 2600 subs, 650-700 read my sales emails, and of that number only 120 click through to my call-to-action. Of the 200 people that eventually got to my sales page, my conversion rate only ended up being about 5% for a course that costs $109 – $139. (Let’s assume I’ve done my audience research, and I’m using tried-and-true copy-writing techniques)

I would have to convert 20-40 people a month with my 5 courses (price range $89-$339) to make $4000/month. After taking Ramit Sethi’s Zero-to-Launch, the info in that course suggests that it’s statistically impossible to convert that many people, and I should be aiming to convert 1 – 2.5% of my list for a given course over an entire year. So I’m completely confused. Because I am barely doing this with five courses, much less with one course that I offer. According to Ramit’s model, I’m pretty much right where I should be (not necessarily where I want to be). But according to your analysis, I’m way off.

That being said, I use leadpages for everything and love the product, and I’m going to try and use your suggestion of selling through webinars. I haven’t tried this yet, but it sounds like it would be a good fit for me.

Moutassem

I share your experience Navid. I have accumulated 10,000+ subs over 4 years, and with a conversion rate of 2,5% monthly and a product at 99€, I earn between 800 and 1000€ per month. Unless I sell a much higher priced product the numbers proposed by Clay are, I believe, way too optimistic for many niches and industries.

Andre

Depends on your market. The U.S. market is huge and has way more growth potential than European markets, which are fragmented by language and culture. In general, the American audience has a more enthusiastic and forward looking mentality. You’ll find more people willing to pay for self-improvement and other enabling information.

@Navid, what tool are you using for engaging with your subscribers? Doing any email marketing automation? If not using Drip, have a close look.

Navid Goldrick

Hi Anil, I use MailChimp and I use several free email courses using automation as well as leadmagnets. As well as a fairly regular newsletter. I do a new campaign every other month. I could increase connection to my subscribers by adding them to automated funnels based on their engagement while recycling/repackaging older posts and newsletters. That is something I haven’t done yet because my newsletter is fairly regular and I often promote my products when appropriate.

Awesome episode!
Personally I plan to go step-by-step from a note in a local store to a complete digital marketing campaign.

Alan Dunne

Hi Clay and Pat, thanks for a great show. I am on currently on rung number 1 – building up my email list to eventually help people manage their behaviour in order to lose weight. I intend converting through my blog posts as I am stronger at writing than I am on video, plus it is hard to record in the house with 2 crazy young boys running around the place shouting 🙂

Aaron Morgan

Pay & Clay this is hands down the most value I have received in a podcast! Thanks to both of you for being open and transparent with your tactics and what it takes to be successful. I am 6 months into building a marketing company and it has been so much fun! I look forwrd to follow the rungs that Clay suggested. I have been using word of mouth to build my business and I would like to focus on two things to take it to the next level. Email and video. I would like to include video in all emails and educate small service based businesses.
Thanks again for all that you do.

William Donahue

Clay this interview was super helpful. It’s clear that you came with a well flushed out itinerary which was really nice. And congrats on the acquisition of Drip (I’m still using Active Campaign but looking to make the switch shortly).

I’ve been focusing on driving sales by using content marketing to build a list. And then via a series of drip emails I drive that audience to a sales page. The reason why I am going with this approach is it is not a very expensive product (about $50/mo) so I don’t want to do high touch sales. And I’d also like to be able to focus on building an as automated as possible funnel.

Brian Andrews

Clay,

I plan to run highly targeted ads on Facebook that go to Leadpages with simple funnels running behind them. It is simple and it works! Enough said…

Great take-aways and action items. Made me think about the 5 1s and the how to convert people. After some thought, I plan to use webinars. This works well for my business because the primary product (currently) is coaching and consulting services and the webinars provide a glimpse into the service customers will receive.

Jordan Powers

I have two things I am doing right now – one is a business and one is a hobby/network building tool in the form of a podcast which is currently not generating revenue. While I love building a network of fellow enthusiasts in my area of interest, it is taking away from my main business, and I am now starting to think of this as a separate (failing) business in the sense that I am dedicating a lot of time and resources to it with no financial return.

I would like to change directions of the podcast to focus more on my area of expertise to position myself better in my own industry. I essentially have this platform of over 2000 subscribers but am not doing anything to leverage this for my own business. It will be my biggest challenge to figure out how to tie this in, but I think it will be worth it to make myself a 1 business person.

Jonathan Reaux

Wow, this was a great one. Thanks Pat and Clay!
I teach guitar at simplifiedguitar.com. All of the material right now is free, and I have a 3-step guide give-a-way to grow my e-mail list. I started the site 6 months ago and have an email list of 1,200. My main source of traffic has been YouTube.
I’ve been working on an online course that I plan to roll out soon, and I’ve just completed a Beta Test for it. I provide pre-recorded lessons, live Q&A’s, and a Facebook community for critiques & interaction. My students love the personal access to me the best, and are willing to pay for it, but my concern is that this will turn into something other than passive income. I can only give attention to so many people, and this will limit how many students I can handle. I’m wondering, Pat, how you dealt with this on your Smart From Scratch course, because I know you offer more personal interaction for your students. I plan to offer lifetime access, but should I limit the course to a number of students? I can’t imagine trying to interact with 1,000 students on a personal level, while still delivering good value.
How do you deliver great value through offering personal access and not give up all of your time in the process?

Damon Wilson

Great podcast guys! My conversion mechanism is content marketing to a sales page.

And a question – if our business the niche is super small I assume the 2000 email list should be reduced? How much so? For example, my niche is lacrosse goalies.

Leonisha Clayton

Hi Clay and Pat. Thank you for providing so much valuable information. I personally like webinars so that is what I plan to use as my conversion mechanism. I feel it adds a personal connection but it’s not as time consuming as one-on-one. But with using webinars won’t I still need something similar to a sales page to get people to sign up for my webinar?

Sean Fitzgerald

Hi Clay, My conversion mechanism is youtube video. I have no idea what I’m doing but I will build my airplane as I fly it, as they say. Thanks for all the help you and Pat provide!

Jeh

This are amazing tips. I’m a business owner and kept trying to come out with new products to generate more revenue rather than promoting our current main product as much.

Er

On page 14 of the transcript you start to talk about the rule of Five Ones.
Will some one please list the Five Ones?
Product
Conversion
Traffic Source
?
?
Thank you !

Scott Olsen

1 Year to get to $100K
1 More year to get to $1M

Reuben Ramirez

Wow! Loved this episode! So many golden nuggets of REAL information to set me straight, and back on the right path! Thanks to Clay
& Pat! c/s

That was my first Smart Passive Income podcast and what a podcast to choose as a starting point. Thanks. I went from discouraged to encouraged to discouraged to excited to confused to discouraged to excited all in this one episode. I certainly fall into the category of ADD when it comes to this online business stuff. My wife and I have been teaching, speaking, coaching marriages and parents for several years. We approach it from a faith perspective and certainly have an intense passion for it. For the last two years we’ve tried to be intentional about growing our ministry as an online business (Axisministries.ORG). I’ve been in the non-profit ministry space for the last 20+ years. But I hate raising money (having to sit and ask someone to financially support my passion… as much as I believe in the importance of what we do). So, we believe our content is valuable enough to support what we are doing and our dream, which would be to have the resources to provide even more and better resources for parents and families. We’ve spoken around the country, primarily at churches or other faith based venues, on family. I’ve floundered for these past 2 years, trying out podcasting, blogging, video, Facebook ads, course creation… we still don’t have 2,000 subscribers, but I’m sure it’s because we don’t have a clear plan in place. Yes, I have lead pages and yes we’ve created some landing pages, but right now I feel like everything is all over the place. So, I’m trying to take your podcast to heart. My wife and I are on the older side of this techie market (I’m 58) so some of this doesn’t come naturally to me. I think, I’m going to start with creating 1 clear funnel for collecting emails and use Facebook (videos and FB live) to get in front of folks. Is this along the lines of what you are suggesting in your podcast? Sorry for being a little slow.

Delwyn

Good on you David. I’m in the same age bracket and do sometimes wonder about launching into all this when clearly most of the folks doing it are younger. It was our son listening to Pat that got us started. Marriages need a lot of support so – go you!
Delwyn

chris

Wow. Great podcast, I’ve shared with a few friends that are jut starting out. Re your contest, my plan for my new business in the restaurant space, I will be initially converting subscribers with e books, I’m comfortable with the medium and am confident I can offer great content. Next up, video!

Justin Thompson

Clay, this was super amazing content! I had not listened to your previous interview with Pat, so this inspired me to go listen to episode 78. I have now listened to this one twice and the other one once. I am a physical therapist and I just opened my own physical therapy clinic. I want my clinic to revolve around chronic pain. New to the world of email and internet marketing so I am starting from scratch. I started today with your advice from episode 78 about making a resource guide. I will use this and facebook ads to start building my email list and get to work on starting a blog. This was super helpful information that I will continue to reference over the next few years. Thanks!

Alex Hollis

My topic is governance risk and compliance for startups

Nadine Anderson

Awesome episode!! I’m in the planning phase of my new venture and I’m trying not to procrastinate too much. This episode was great for me as it has given me clear milestones to measure how far along I am. It’s exactly what I need: I love stats.

I think I will use webinars as my conversion tool, for a few reasons: 1) I hate writing and the though of writing a long sales page and perfecting my copy sounds daunting. I am mildly dyslexic and getting my thoughts on to paper isn’t my bag. 2) It’s more personable, viewers will be able to get a sense of my personality and whether I would be the right fit for them. 3) It’s a perfect example of my teaching style and how I disseminate information.

Clay, Pat, awesome podcast. Listened to it in the car yesterday. I will definitely continue focusing on blogging/content marketing. I do have a question though – when you refer to using content marketing as your “one”, do you also focus on just one traffic source to that content? Because of course you have clicks coming from Facebook, Pinterest, organic search, guest posts etc – do you suggest just focusing your efforts on one of these sources?

Hey Clay and Pat! Thanks for a great episode. I was simultaneously excited and scared after listening. I’ve been at the podcast game for two years and have definitely made quite the dent in my niche. I’m in the Choir Director niche (yeah, I know, right?!) with a podcast called CHOIR NINJA, and I plan on using webinars for my conversion method. I’ve used them with success in the past, but always had a tough time with other landing page products and having to use Zapier to integrate to my email list and…what a headache! Combined with the webinar skills I learned from Tim Paige, Leadpages and Leaddigits would be a game-changer for me! In return, I’d be happy to be your “difficult niche case-study”! If one can make money in CHOIR, one can make money anywhere!

Jonathan Royce

I’ll be blogging as my means of list building.

Kevin T

Noah Kagan recommends to get 3 customers for your product to validate in 24 hours, instead of building MVA or blogging. Essentially kind of the opposite of your approach. What’s your opinion of this approach?

Scott Olsen

So impressed with this–thank you Clay for laying out such a clear structure and pitfalls to avoid. Pat, thanks for getting Clay to talk about why he was so invested in his journey as an entrepreneur. I love hearing people’s why!

I plan on using Webinars to convert my audience because I think it ties neatly into using partnerships as a traffic source. Plus I always am more energized when I get to present with either another speaker or with direct questions from the audience.

MCarmen Diaz

Thank you so much, Clay and Pat for this invaluable information! I’m new to blogging and online businesses, so I haven’t already thought about my conversion method, but I have the topic to write about and build my audience. I’m passionate about cooking and children, so I decided to write about cooking with children. I’m not sure if that’s a great idea to monetize in rung two of the ladder, I guess that I’ll know after trying to build my audience 🙂

Clay and Pat, this podcast was awesome! Thanks for all the helpful, specific tips!

Peter Vane

Great, great podcast. Genuine and high quality. Can’t ask for more than that. Thanks Clay and Pat.

I help business owners and operators do successful Business Award entries at businessawardsguide.com. It’s amazing how many business people still don’t understand the intrinsic value of entering a Business Award regardless of whether they win. It is a wonderful opportunity.
My conversion process ultimately will be via webinar. Right now I am list building. 35 today, 300 by 1st June. Action NOW!
Thanks again.

Delwyn

Thanks for the show Pat and Clay. I know this is a bit late to write but I’ve not yet commented on your website Pat even though I have heard your podcast heaps of times in the car and appreciated it very much. Currently working through smart from scratch. Really impressed with how you put it together.
Lots to digest today. I’m a music teacher, ex broadcaster (many years ago)from Christchurch, New Zealand and really want to connect with parents who want help with their children in piano/music lessons because the one thing I see to sucess at learning a musical instrument in children is often directly due to the parent’s engagement with their learning. I’d like to do this with video. 2000 subscribers sounds absolutely huge to me but I love to talk with parents/teachers about the issues they face and am interested in how to connect the next generation with good success at learning their instruments whatever medium they use. Currently I don’t advertise for pupils as I have more than enough enquiring and have a low attrition rate of pupils leaving. Must be doing something right. I only have a very small email list (parents of my own pupils) but feel challenged to look at the 2000 figure as do-able. Gulp.
Thanks, Delwyn

Frank C Jones

Through RaleighSEOmeetup.org I have almost 3,000 subscribers. This year, I’m starting to offer courses to help people get started with search engine optimization. My one conversion method will be a sales page.

This was the perfect thing for my sister and I to listen to right now! We are in the beginning phases of our business and we are so all over the place! Our mission is to provide support and education to dance studio owners. We owned and operated a dance studio for 8 years and after selling, we have found that so many studio owners out there don’t have the know how when it comes to running the business side of things. That is where we want to help because it is something we excelled at.

In our new business we have been working 1 on 1 with studios but have found it is really hard to convince dance studio owners to buy into these 1 on 1 packages because they don’t have the capital or time to really invest (most of the time they are very small operations). We want to shift to working on a larger scale but at a lower price point by doing courses and group coaching instead.

After listening to your podcast today, We both agreed the path to success here is through putting our time and energy into growing our list BEFORE creating these new courses/groups. Before today, we were going to try and do it all at once. Realistically we would have been spread too thin and we would probably only make about $50 because our list is pretty small right now. Thank you so much for the great advice, really it was everything we needed to hear in this moment!

I feel like this info really only applies to B2B businesses. Though I’m sure I could improve in some areas, I’m just barely making 6 figures with 34000 on my email list, 2-3 million page views per month, a membership site, and over 100k followers on various forms of social media. I’m always growing, adding, and improving, but nowhere near 7 figures even with a large audience.

Andre

You can be happy. An independent self-employed making “barely 6 figures” merely from selling information online is pretty successful. Keep it up and don’t worry.

Patrick Curtis

Shannon – I’m in a similar boat. My online community is about to hit 500,000 registered members and our email list is ~120,000 (double opt-in), 4+ million pageviews/month…we are past 7 figures, but it took us a VERY long time to get to where we are now. Happy to discuss in case we can share insight with one another. [email protected]

Richard Bennett

So this episode posted three days ago and I’ve listened to it four times because I’ve always been in the car rather than in a position to take notes. I’m going to listen one more time, but with paper and pencil this time. My struggle has been how to get subscribers and I think I have the answer after listening to Nyr on episode 262. Now I feel like I have a plan on what to do with those 2000 subscribers once I get them. I have a great feeling about this! Thanks Clay for an outstanding “give”, and thanks Pat for your deep archive of wisdom both from you and your guests. Yours is the only podcast I listen to.

Thanks Clay for sharing your insights. I just started my blog so I’m currently focusing on building a minimum viable audience. I think I’ll focus on creating a sales page.

Mel Ngui

Okay, leaving my action here:

I’m at the stage where I dont have an audience yet, so I am at MVA. My blog is http://www.mystartupnomad.com (not yet launched) where my topics focus on empowering single women in their early 30s (like myself) to take the leap from corporate life to economic power through social entrepreneurship. I will be using myself as a case study as I have just plunged from corporate life to social impact start up life. Yup, i’m big on business as the power of good to improve the lives of the 4Billion living in lesser developed communities around the world. Check out some of my team’s work here: http://www.mandalagroup.org. This episode has definitely helped me to reframe how i simplify my blog and keep it laser focused on one conversion mechanism: podcasting , i will generate traffic through content marketing 🙂

Robert Cunningham

I have just joined Lead Pages through Pat’s affiliate link. I really look forward to using the tool.
I have heard it said “Thou shall not have more than 1” but Im going to break that rule.
I really want to teach (probably face to face or through a webinar) Adwords and Facebook Ads. Of course my traffic source will be Adwords and Facebook – I have 60 email addresses so far, and with Lead Pages, hope to achieve the 2000 suggested.

Thank you so much! This is one important episode perfect for what am working on! My project is about helping small nonprofit organizations to have a checklist and simple tools on the key areas in their organization which is a common weakness. This is my hope to look into reaching 2k MVA.

Wow – Thank you for this Podcast episode. I have been doing all the things you say not to – I have an ebook which I want to expand to a video course and have been focussing on SEO, Forums, Google Ads, Facebook Ads, Webinars, Youtube etc etc, I am not going to focus on my email list which is currently just over 2000 but am not sure if they are all raving fans! So once I have that sorted will then just focus on SEO as in my niche – Computer Networking I get a ton of traffic from people googling things every day – I now have a 12 month target to make 100k a year! Awesome

Thanks! i have the whole ADD thing going on! I have started many things and set it all up behind and self sabotage and not got it out there. Recently, I have come back to my coaching training and intuition and revisiting my child hood dream of writing. Embracing how much easier it is now with blogging to pursue my passion, I am calling on my admin/biz and VA experience as well as my passion for health to start producing pieces. This podcast has clarified my path for me! I will be using the sales page and producing valuable content for people either looking for extra income, lifestyle shift or new career. I am passionate about helping people and business so I am confident I will give value! Tried webinars and failed but realising I am not a public speaker nor do I have any desire. I have ‘telemarketing’ (hate that word) in many conventional jobs so not keen to revisit. When Clay said about sales page – lightbulb! THANKS to you both! I am re inspired – cheers 🙂

Thank you for the actionable content and the resources to create my own plan! The local school district I in which I work has plans to significantly cut the one part of my job that I am passionate about. I could not have found this information at a better time! My passion is helping people discover and use technology to overcome disabilities. With the blueprint provided, I can clearly see how I can make a bigger impact and replace my current income. I will be writing my first blog post on the topic today.

I specifically liked the “only pick one biz”. I do a little freelance and a little blogging on a personal development. I need to decide.

A question if I pick the pers development idea: what’s the best way to build he 2K subs, priming them for the offer to come in there second rung phase.

AD

Thanks Clay & Pat,

Judging from the comments consider mission accomplished for most downloads.

Lots of good pointers for me to rethink my strategy. Like a lot of folks I think it’s not easy to make $2 per subscriber unless you have found something that is missing badly in the market and the first mover has the advantage and can expect such returns.

I would like to know how this can applied to physical products as well as it has more costs involved.

And of course I would like to through in my name in the hat for free membership.
– I will use sales page for conversion.
– Content marketing as my traffic source

Right now I do a lot of video and have the largest following on my Youtube channel, so I’d imagine that would be the best way to try to convert people. I’m thinking maybe live videos/webinars.

chapmoreno

Gentlemen, thanks SO VERY MUCH! I have been on the ledge ready to start a podcast, and i’m just like a kid on the diving board for the first time. I go to the edge, look over, wait a while, and then go back down the board so others can go. I watch them, and then get in line, get on the board, and repeat. This is the one podcast that will actually SHOW me how to do this!! I’m jumping!! WOOHOO!!!

Marc Papp

Thank you for this great workshop podcast Clay and Pat. Currently I am focusing on videos since my products are more on trainings.

I JUST recorded a question on focus, for AskPat, and this episode helps a lot! I’m at a point where I feel so ADD I need to focus on something, and I’m not sure what. I loved this conversation and it lays out such a clear plan. I’m at Rung 1-trying to build an audience. This is my struggle point, because I was producing a podcast, but it has not gained much traction. I think getting 2,000 email subscribers in 3 months is a real challenge, and I’m wondering if during this time you just focus on one traffic generator or more than one. So, if I have a blog/podcast and am doing content marketing, should I pick one social media platform for getting people to my blog to sign up for my list? Or should I try to be on several? My niche is global learning and education for kids. I would LOVE to have LeadPages to help me in my next rung of the ladder! Thanks so much for this episode!

Nicole Vitale

Thank you for a great episode! I am just starting out so I am on ladder rung 1. Still need to build my subscriber list! But I think I will eventually focus on webinars as my conversion tool. I am pretty comfortable with the format since I have used that in my current job.

Matthew Wilson

Clay and Pat, all I can say is WOW. I’ve been a long-time SPI podcast listener and this is one of the best interviews I’ve heard. I’m more of a WANTrepreneur right now- full time job, five kids, very little extra time. And ironically, I think part of my problem is that I have a hard time picking one thing and focusing on it (just ask my wife). One thing I’d really like to do is help mentor youth, particularly high-schoolers. I think they’re so overlooked. I want to launch a resource for them and their parents to help set them up on a life plan and figure out early on what they should do with their lives, especially entrepreneurship. I have no shortage of ideas, where I fall short is implementation and sticking with something long enough for it to work.

Before this episode, I was actually considering Leadpages among other options. I am now convinced that’s what I’ll be using. I believe my one main lead source will be Facebook ads. At least it’s what I’m most familiar with.

Anyway, thanks again! So much to think about- my brain is spinning. You have no idea how far-reaching your influence is.

first of all thank you for this amazing piece of information. I follow Pat since 2 years, and I have learned a lot here.

I run Finance blog in Spanish and lately started to make animated videos about Finance, which are resumen of my blog posts. It started to work and what I think about is create the strategy to get client based on:
– get traffic on Youtube
– send viewers to landing page where they can subscribe for free piece of content
– in that free content mention that I have advanced course on topic, and they can buy it from there

That said, right now I have to work on this advanced course which I want to sell.

Listening to podcast and reading comments of other listeners, I believe everything is possible. Thanks guys!

Pietro

Hi Kamil, what’s your blog URL? Where are you based? I ask because I’m about to start working on screenwriting content and I’m struggling to decide if it should be in English or Spanish. I’m an Italian living in México. If you have time, I’d love to chat and learn from your experience.

Hola Pietro, the blog URL is: http://www.aprendizfinanciero.com
I started in 2015, but it was this month that I manage to double my email list (2800 people at the moment), with help of the Youtube channel, where I create videos based on my articles. I create it together with my wife. If you would like to ask something, you can visit us and contact us with your questions. Have a nice day.

I almost forgot… we are based in Poland, and I am a Pole, my wife is from Honduras.

Wendy Watkins

Thank you so much for this super helpful episode. I was feeling really overwhelmed and thinking that I had to do everything RIGHT NOW, which made me feel helpless/hopeless and basically stalled. But your training snapped my thinking into place – focusing on just one thing – and now I feel focused and empowered.

For conversions, I’m a bit torn. For an entry-level offer I think a sales page is the way I want to go. But when I get to the next rung, I’m going to go with one-on-one conversations, likely on the phone.

BTW, this is the first time I’ve ever left a comment on a podcast and I’ve been a total podcast junkie for almost 10 years, so that’s how good this one was.

Mark Groleau

I just want to thank you for being a much-needed sherpa for me in what has become a discombobulating part of the entrepreneurial journey-map.

My niche as a full-time premium wedding officiant is wedding officiating; specifically, helping newer and would-be officiants discover that weddings can be fun, moving, and the most exciting part of a wedding day. I have done customer research and interviews, created an online course, and I’m giving away a cheat sheet using Leadpages at unboringofficiant.com.

Very briefly, what I had done is I put all my eggs in the Facebook ads basket, but quickly (and to my surprise) I discovered – when it came time to target a demographic – that wedding officiants are not a “type” of person to target. Lots of money went to myriad ad sets with very few conversions.

So I’ve felt a bit lost in the woods with so, so, so many strategies for list-building to choose from and try. Your “Rules of 1” are so helpful. I need to pick 1 and go with it. Hone it. Ride it out.

And so I’ve picked content creation al la Pat Flynn: become an authority by serving up articles and content, providing incredible value to the tribe I want to help. Write, blog, post, guest-post, rinse, repeat. I won’t be distracted by the dozen other list-building strategies. This will be my “1.” Create amazing tips and pro tools so that when someone needs to officiate a wedding, they know just who to look up… because I provide such great value.

Thanks for modelling what I’m hoping to become for the world of wedding officiating!

Michael

Thanks, Clay and Pat, you guys are awesome! Very detail information for each ladder. I think I`m still in the first ladder (closed to 1k subs). My blog is to help new immigrants to live in the US. I share my life experience and how I have accomplished. As the conversion mechanism, I will form my blog posts to an E-book that provide my audiences a systematic guideline.

I want to design, a sales page with a super useful optin for my subscribers.I am in India and currently also taking Pat’s course too.I am a doctor and a healthy/wellness mom blogger and trying out everything Pat is suggesting.This podcast was really useful.Will try to get rid of ault ADHD .My blog is http://healthwealthbridge.com.As usual super value for time.

My traffic source I’m going to actively grow my email subscriber list. I have passively just had the button on the website, but haven’t been doing with it. I need to start producing value-added newsletters and continuing to push people to join.

What a fabulous show! I’m basically starting from scratch and need to build my email list. My area of focus is helping people create their remarkable life stories, because everyone has a remarkable story! I think my primary conversion tool will be a sales page. Honestly, my email list (or lack thereof) has stalled me on many occasions. Thanks to you guys, I can see light at the end of the tunnel. First up: build the list to 2,000 – and stop focusing on step #437 🙂 Would LOVE to bring home the Leadpages membership. Regardless, this was one of the most helpful podcasts I’ve listened to.

johnehadskeyjr

Thanks for all your great information. I am just starting out. I am interested in affiliate income and then growing a membership website. Thanks very much John Hadskey Jr

Hi Pat and Clay! I was literally on the edge of my seat the whole episode. Such clear, actionable advice like this is far more rare than it should be. I’m selling fitness and nutrition consultation and my primary conversion mechanism is one-on-one chats with potential clients. Whether on skype, in person, or over the phone. Clay, you definitely brought it this episode – AGAIN! [insert further awesome/witty comments expressing appreciation for SPI and Clay]

Awesome training Clay- super pumped to implement some of the recommendations. My traffic source is going to be webinars- my topic lends itself well. Thanks for all you do- and being awesomely generous.

Wesley Henderson

My list building strategy is blogs (and guest post blogs) on how to hack legal decisions until online businesses can afford legal fees. Thanks for the great information. I’ve been working off and on for a few years to put together a digestible course for new business owners. SPI always breathes new life into the venture. Thanks.

Wes — I am working on something similar and trying to niche down for law for creative/online influencers…I would love to connect because there is a HUGE need in this space.

john kinnunen

Clay thank you for all that awesome content ill be listening to this podcast over again. Sure i missed some things.
Im strongly with my minimal viable audience.
I’m not to the point of converting people yet but when i am it will be through copy writing, possibly video.

James

This was a fantastic ep! I love the training episodes.

I’m breaking one of the 5 commandments by trying to have too many businesses. But the industry I know the most about is hair salons. I’ve already started writing on LinkedIn, where my largest network is. I have GetResponse as my ESP because I do some affiliate marketing thru JVZoo and Clickbank, and they integrate with GetResponse.

No subscribers yet. I’m writing a salon success cheat sheet to use as a lead magnet, and I’ll use a GR built-in landing page to attract subscribers. Stylists are very entrepreneurial, but they tend to be a little flighty. So my gig is to help them set up systems to be more successful.

Right now I’m only writing. I think video will come next as I get a little more time on my hands and a some more topics to speak to.

Kingsley Grant

Thanks Pat and Clay. I usually tune out when I hear a show that have a guest I’ve heard on other platforms or even on this show. But as Pat said, episode 78 had me hooked. I don’t currently use Lead Pages but have secretly desired to do so but feel I have to be able to justify to my wife that I have earned the right to purchase it. 🙂 Today’s show was another great one that I think will surpass episode 78’s downloads. Pat, make sure we hear about it. Thanks to you both for such a great, practical and digestable show. Boom!

JORGE SCIUPAC

Thank you, Pat. Thank you Clay. As the episode 78, this was a very helpful and practical training session. I am relatively new in the online business world and trying to learn “everything” gets me dizzy… and overwhelmed, sometimes. The explanation and rules that Clay shared with Pat felt like a relieve! I loved the 5 rules of 1.
Regarding my business, I have a limited audience in the online world (trying to expand my offline business globally by using the online tools) and the explanation of building the MVA “Minimum Viable Audience” felt achievable. To answer your question, Clay, the conversion mechanism I would like to use is Webinars that could move interested people into one-on-one conversations. What do you think?

Matt

I can’t wait to use this info. I’m looking to use a blog and convert traffic to my product by writing online sales copy!

Lisa kelly

Wow, great info guys. My best conversion outlet is VIDEO VIDEO VIDEO. I have a jewelry making supply company so a visual with “how to” is our best converter. Although I would love to win your giveaway, I can’t wait! I am going to sign up for lead pages this week 🙂

Jim Samuel

This was one of the best podcasts I have heard anywhere in a long time. I listened while I was doing yard work. I am going to have to listen to it again and take notes.

It was particularly timely for me as I am in the starting stages of a new blog/podcast combination aimed at people 55 and over. The working title is 10,000 Days because that is the approximate number of days between age 55 and 85. It will feature information on making the most of your last 30 years of life, whether that is starting a business, changing careers, adventure travel, starting a non-profit, etc.

Anyway, thanks to Clay and Pat for this great podcast.

Kim Nicola

Great episode, after buying a lot of products I feel that this did more for me than others. I will get started tomorrow morning by creating a blog about my biggest passion – People development and motivation. Learning here I come!

Tae-Jun Ahn

Clay is a true leader of internet marketing. I currently use leadpages and drip everyday. This is something that I really needed hear at my stage of business development.

What a brilliant episode! I immediately started listening to the episode again once it finished! Thanks Pat and Clay for delivering an amazing course in podcast form. Both of your generosity in sharing your knowledge is unparalleled, and it’s appreciated more than you can imagine. Thanks again!

I felt a little defeated after hearing Clay’s target of 2000 subscribers in 3-6 months (at most, a year) as a metric of viability of later selling a product or service in that space. I maintained that some people launch courses in online marketplaces with no website and zero following and still can earn good passive income or even a descent living.

However, I decided to “get away from [my] monkey mind” (as Clay put it) and start getting into action. I downloaded the free materials (thank you) and I will finish my first course (finally) on Instagram graphics.

Once completed, I would like to take Clay’s advice and focus on webinars as my conversion mechanism because that will afford me the ability to hear the objections/pain points in order to make my course even better!

Specifically, I would like to use video in a pre-recorded webinar (with a live chat component that I monitor) so that I can concentrate on answering questions…until I feel more comfortable with live on-camera webinars. ☺

Thank you for rooting for me, Clay, and for the information you and Pat provided in SPI Podcast #263.

Meg @ Meg.Marketing

I don’t have my audience established quite yet – the topic I am generating my audience around is Facebook Marketing for small business owners and new entrepreneurs (with special topics focused on local businesses). I break complex concepts down so that small businesses can implement all of the same strategies that the big businesses are taking advantage of. I am launching a Podcast next month, and will provide blog-like content to compliment the show notes – and am growing my email list, where I plan on summarizing everything that’s going on. Once I have my audience, and a product in place, my conversion mechanism will likely be 1:1 interactions through either FB groups or in-person presentations and seminars, combined with utilizing my blog/podcast – those are areas in which I am already active, so it would seem to make sense that once I have a product to sell that would be how my audience hears about it… but I suppose that may change as I grow my list and get a feel for my newly acquired audience… I definitely have an issue with trying to do it all, so limiting myself to 1s will be tough, but I am up for the challenge, as I am confident it will lead to success and time to add other things down the road. Really great content – thanks for sharing it with us all!

Paul DeVito

Hey Pat and Clay! Great podcast, much appreciated.

I’m planning on using a sales page once I get to rung two. Thanks again!

Pat & Clay, I remember clearly listening to episode SPI 78 where I was first introduced to Clay and Leadpages. I was impressed and became a Leadpages customer shortly thereafter. However, I was new to the internet marketing world and buying Leadpages was a part of chaotic search for a framework to build a platform for my business ideas without a plan. I dropped Leadpages a year later, frustrated with the complexity of the software, lack of production when I did use it and the cost. Since then I have been on a search to find a way to “connect the dots” of the elements of internet marketing and find an understandable process that I can understand and implement. I listened to this episode SPI 263 with Clay and had an “aha” moment when you unpacked the “Laddering Up” process. I finally “got it” and now have a actual process to follow to achieve my “massive vision.” Thank you Clay and Pat for “connecting the dots” for me. Here’s what I’m doing now. I have a blog and podcast (www.fortydayway.com) where I am helping people overcome personal adversity to achieve success and their “promised life”. This is my platform to recruit my first 2000 subscribers. When I get 2000 followers (by July 31) I will convert them with weekly webinars based on my teaching of my “40 Day Way” process designed around lessons learned from my blog comments, podcast guests and commenters and learning from the needs, wants and desires of my coaching clients. I have a new confidence that I will climb the rungs of this ladder as Clay described and I will succeed…for the first time. Thank you Clay and Pat for giving me some clarity for what has been an excruciating search for process and plan that makes sense. I think I will even take a fresh look at Leadpages. Thanks again. Do All The Good You Can. Rev. Dr. Brad Miller

Kara Gott Warner

Clay and Pat,
Thanks so much for your generosity in creating this training!

My conversion mechanism is weekly live video on my business Facebook page which I’ve been doing consistently every week for about a year now, but it wasn’t until January that I started to have a focused CTA in each video to build my Patreon community which has gone from only 8 patrons in January to now over 100.

To answer your question about why I use this mechanism– it’s because it allows me to have an authentic and highly engaged experience with my audience because I can ask then questions in real time and get feedback. I know this sounds corny, but after each video I think–what a blessing that I get to do this each week as a way to build my community, because I love it! At the end of the day, it’s the passion for connecting with my community is what actually drives my business.

Thanks again for the gift of this episode!
Kara ?

Adam Smith

Hey guys great podcast. No fluff Clay, straight talk. I’ve been on the fence about lead pages and this put me over the edge. I’m going to get on lead pages for sure. Must be one of the best podcasts I’ve ever heard. Im going to convert through webinars because I personally attend a lot of those. Then, I’m looking to get traffic through partnerships. The reason why is because my business is about helping people develop stronger human connections through personal, romantic and professional relationships. That’s what partnerships are all about. Thanks for putting this together.

I did have one question though – if I’m looking to start building an audience to 2000, should I just focus on creating blog posts or would you recommend other forms of content creation to drive traffic to my page? If I understood it correctly, the five commandments – especially not focusing only on more than one day of content marketing per month, only apply for the second rung correct.

Great episode! To answer your question, my conversion mechanism will be a blog. Is that valid for affiliate marketing? The plan for conversion is to identify the best products in certain niches and write in-depth, unbiased reviews.

Keeon Taylor

Hey Pat and Clay I am using a sales page for conversions. I already use leadpages. Im offering a 7 page free ebook which will have a high conversion rate. Once people subscribe to download the free ebook they will then be led to a longer sales page of a low priced ebook. A long well written sales page will convert well because people will believe in the value after reading the first well written free ebook.

David Lafond

This podcast with Clay was awesome! In my case, I’m helping my sister to leverage is niche to another level. She got 15,000 true FB fans and with automation, lead magnet, etc we were able to bring our mailing list to 3000 contacts in one year now. Ho… and this is a French talking niche 🙂 I’m using a lots of automation but one part that I’m starting to get pis.(*$#$ off is quickly building landing page when needed. I’m using WordPress and many time when I need a new landing page I get discouraged and just don’t do it because I know it will take too much time… Right now our stream is providing a lots of free informations, capturing email on our blog, pushing traffic from FB to the blog, and soon we want to start monetize all this with advanced courses. To help conversion she is doing weekly live Q&A on FB. But I need to listen again to the podcast and take notes because many things said that we can apply to the process now. Thanks again for all the valuable information.

Craig

Great episode with amazing value! I just started a business selling a small number of educational physical products to teachers and elementary school students. For my conversion mechanism, I’m planning to use webinars to sell my products. The main reason is that I personally have made big purchases after listening to great webinars. They are a great way to connect with your audience and to give a lot of details about your products. Thanks so much!!

Corey Hinde

Thanks SO SO much – that was a great show – hence why this comment thread is going mental……

My ONE conversion mechanism will be a sales page / lead page – hmmmm….. know of any goodies?

(Membership based fat loss business)

Burak Öztürk

Hey guys. This was an amazing episode and I thank you for it =)

My one mechanism is automated product launches. I have multiple lead magnets on my site that get people on my list. And based on what Lead magnet they have downloaded, I know their main pain points. I have a few different automated funnels that sell the same product but have different messaging based on the Lead magnet they have downloaded or the actions they take (like clicking on specific links) in my e-mail marketing program.

My one traffic source right now is video content marketing from Youtube. So based on the video I put out, I link to a specific lead magnet on the video that I know people will want if they are watching that video. And that gets people into my funnel and starts the automated product launch sequences.

What’s up men? First off, the episode was super dope. Tons of actionable advice that was indeed timely for me.

I JUST launched my first physical product and a digital product on top of it as an upsell. So the episode was perfect because I did need clarity on which traffic source I would focus on and which conversion mechanism I’d go with.

I do host a live video podcast weekly on FB and running ads there converted well for me during my launch month. So I will focus on that as a traffic source and have a well written sales page as my conversion mechanism.

Thank you for the content and helping so many!

Florian

Hey Clay & Pat,

Thanks a lot, what an amazing episode. I already enjoyed the first episode with Clay and implemented a lot of the suggestions. Great!

Now here’s the conversion mechanism I am going to focus on:
It will be content marketing. My business partner and I decided on this strategy some time ago and so far we’ve been loving it.

We sell whisky subscription boxes and the way how our strategy works is as follows:
We set up a lead magnet – a checklist with 10 steps for buying whisky at the store. And once somebody signs up for it we send them an email every three days with a more detailed explanation of one of the 10 steps on the checklist. After 5 emails we mention our product for the first time and eventually we are sending a hard sell email. Then we conclude with more content emails.

Why we do it:
We love to write informative and entertaining content about whisky. That’s why this is our current conversion strategy.

Thanks a lot again for the great episode.

Best,
Florian

Jennie Armstrong

I’m new on my SPI journey, and absolutely loved this podcast. Really helped me to work out where to start. For my sales conversion I’m hoping to have a sales page on my website but I’m going to have to start off by building my blog and getting some subscribers! Watch this space!!!

Clay: Fantastic work. Gave me lots to think about. A couple big important things I took away were to not get ahead of yourself – get to 2k subscribers before getting distracted by too many other things. And then I love the idea of 1-1-1 and keeping it simple, then doubling down once you get further along.

Cheryl Strachan, RD

Thanks for doing this Clay and Pat. Your previous episode was great too. I’m just winding down a big (for me) contract, and looking forward to working on building towards that MVA. I have only a tiny 160 right now, mostly friends and former clients. Lots of work to do. Thanks for the blueprint. I’m more of a writer, so I’m going to go with a sales page for conversion for now. Thanks!

Tori Levine

I’m going to focus more on video because this seems to work best for me and my clients. This way they can get to know me and feel comfortable with me.

Great episode, breaks it down nicely. I’m not sure about the accuracy of the numbers across niches and geographical, but I guess it makes the content easier to present. My number one lead generation is my podcast where people subsequently come to the website. I have over 3000 people on my list now, but nowhere near $4000 – educational niche. I’ll be branching out to a subset of the niche (breaking one of the cardinal rules, I guess) we’ll see where that takes me.

This ENTIRE episode was dope, but the one thing I heard about @claycollins:disqus commentary about what he see’s people doing was priceless. ADD as he describes it, hit’s it right on the head and I’ve been watching several of the top online marketers for years to get to a point now where I’m ready to begin launching my own business. I also like how he articulated himself in saying that you should essentially “fall in love with the nuisances” of your market and the solution that you’re creating. Seems simple, but for most it can be complicated. I’m going to listen to this episode again, but one of the things I’ve had in mind was to build the product first as that was something that Mike Dillard recommended in a product that I purchased from him last year. What I’m hearing here is a little different in that the recommendation is to use webinars to engage the audience FIRST to see what solution you can create for them. I’ll have to put this in action so I can actually test it, but this definitely got me to thinking. Thanks a lot!

James Abell

Hi I really found this podcast useful. I had the idea to complete a book and a smaller physical item over the next few months based on a visual scifi universe I am making, I want to make things later with it too. Thanks, after listening to this, I will concentrate on the smaller item/product. In the past I’ve been guilty of making too many things based on an idea. This method makes me much more laser focused. It would be interesting to have some information how leadpages could be used to integrate into the first stage. I just about have a budget to pay for a few months lead pages to test if it will attract subscribers, I would not have much of a budget thereafter to pay for facebook ads etc to attract people to the lead page. If you could send me any pointers it would be really helpful. Heres to the next few months!

Clay and Pat – Thanks so much for a value packed session! I have a quick question about focusing on the quality versus quantity of leads: I currently have opt-in forms on my site courtesy of Sumo.com. My question would be: how do I know if those leads are quality or not? And if they aren’t, how do I focus on making the opt-ins I get more quality?

With respect to my key conversion strategy, I’m interesting in learning to do webinars, as that resonates most closely with my style. I have about 700 more subscribers to go before I get to that next step, and I’ve already got my product idea in mind. I was going to work on getting the product out by Q3 of this year, but now I’m going to focus on getting to the MVP number of 2000 with my email list first.

Dallas Stephens

Definitely on rung #1. Need to build my 2,000 MVA. Subject matter for audience and blog is what I’m passionate about as an entrepreneur…freedom and fitness. At age 60 I’ve finally realized the two most important assets I have are my time and my health. Great Podcast. Thank you for the insights.

Great episode! Tons to think about but my biggest takeaway is that I need to start doing webinars to build my audience, authority, and also to take a more direct approach vs. selling from my heels like Clay mentioned. Thanks again for all the great info!

Ila Scott-Ford

Pat and Clay. First I want to thank you both so much for this podcast on laddering up. Ok, I’m going to BEYOND embarrass myself by admitting this. I’ve been working on my products and website for several years. And still haven’t launched—but am close and this podcast training may finally be what gets me there. You mentioned getting trying to learn many things simultaneously. Boy can I relate. For the past several years, I’ve been trapped in a whirlwind of all sorts of expensive courses from top people in the field of expert marketing and information marketing. Most of them are phenomenal courses, but I’ve spent more time still frustrated by what I don’t know (like how to do webinars, video, etc… the technical part), overwhelmed by what I do know and dizzy from spinning in circles trying to do it all, and of course failing at it. To take the embarrassment one more step … Clay, I even subscribed to Lead Pages for awhile … but never acted on it because I was never quite ready … I often blamed my busy job as a Creative Director/Copy for an ad agency because it leaves little time.

But the biggest roadblock has been that I just got frozen in an “all or nothing” mentality, thinking I need to have “all this stuff” done and put on my website before I started sending traffic there. When I heard you talk about laddering up, I suddenly saw a simple way to move forward. I have to tell you, doing one thing at a time excites me (but as an idea person, it will be challenging to quiet my brain … hahahahaha).

So here’s what I’m thinking. You said, “If you are more of an introvert, and you are a writer, then you might want to create a sales page.” I’m a writer and direct response junkie, so I think this could be my conversion mechanism. I love A/B testing. Plus, I have a problem-solving product I’d go to bat for. I love telling about it … and, it’s in a niche that will offer a goldmine of possible mind-grabbing headlines and interesting content, which will also make for a very content rich blog. And I will be coming from a unique perspective. I do not have an MVA yet, but the topics of my blog are around creating information you’d want others to know if anything should happen, inheritance planning, etc. Also, I am the reporter, NOT the expert. So at first, I may feel more comfortable writing a blog than holding a webinar. Eventually, when I get up a few more rungs, I see the value in a podcast and webinars, but for now, I will finally be happy just with the 5 ones. (heavy sigh of relief).

So, sales pages for my conversion mechanism. A content-rich blog for my traffic source. These will work best my work schedule. Plus, I buy mostly from lead pages and blogs, so this also feels very comfortable (and I can start building my MVA and get their input/guidance while I learn the skills i need, or gain the ability to hire help I need, to move up the ladder).

Thank you again… so very much.
Ila Scott-Ford

Brian

I am in the process of rebooting my blog, PlayfulPlatypus.com, and my audience is the parents, teachers and other mentors who are helping young people with autism to find their calling in life. I have 3 boys spread out across the autistic spectrum, from age 24 down to 14, so it is definitely something I am passionate about. I’ve been a software developer for 30 years, so the hard part for me building an audience via my blog – I’m always so tempted to just start writing software when I see a need. This podcast was enormously helpful! My favorite quote was: “I think when people look at building businesses, they often look at the business they want to build, and not the business that they can start today, and then plot a course from the business they can start today, to the business they eventually want to have.” Thanks Clay & Pat!

Thanks for sharing your insights Clay, it was good to hear you speak again after I flew over to attend Converted16. I picked out some key things to implement myself from this episode. So a big thank you!

My conversion tool is video, but in a longer format (circa 30-40mins) where I deliver content from a training module that I often present in person to small groups; in the way of a recorded training video. The reason why I use a recorded video over webinars, is because I can look at the video analytics through Wistia to improve the quality of that video to optimise the conversion rate; and also the viewer can watch as much (or as little) of the video that is most convenient for them at that time; and finally the viewer can get instant access to the training video (as opposed to a live webinar).

Nice Podcast and hello from Bangkok. Since listening to your podcast in 2014 I’ve been working on building my list on mailchimp and now convert kit. I like the idea of the different ladder wrungs and focusing on one thing. Easier said than done, but I like the idea of aiming for the the list of 2000 and using input to build the product. Pick me to win that lead pages membership so I can leave Thrive landing page. thanks

Mark A. Tilsher

Thank you for the awesome episode. This is exactly what I needed at this point in my journey.

I will be focusing on a sales page. I am pretty laser focused on building my 2,000 subscribers and I want to be able to have something located in one spot that I can reference easily.

I enjoy persuasive and informative writing and feel like this is the route to take that has the lowest barrier to entry which will allow me to focus on building subscribers, my #priority!

Hi, my blog is for small animal vets (how’s Gizmo? 😉 ) I have a MVA a little less than 2K but Denmark is a small country.
My 1 traffic source will be content (primarily my podcast) and
my 1 conversion will be via an automated email series and
my 1 offer is a 1-tiered subscription based e-course / membership on Teachable.
Thanks for the tremendous amount of value. You rock. atb Soren

Hi there Pat and Clay – thanks for such an awesome podcast and roadmap to follow – you have made it so simple!!

I have been trying to get my blog and business off the ground for so long and get constantly sidetracked by every new thing I find on the net like how to improve your instagram following, create this product, do this, try that – I never get anywhere. I make a start on all these things and never finish anything. I feel I am trying to learn all this stuff but really what for at this stage? I think my problem is I feel I should know it all and it is all valuable useful stuff but chasing all of that is stopping me from actually doing what I set out to in the first place.!!

As a result I have zero subscribers to my blog but I am starting to get some traction on instagram lately so I have a few followers which is a start.

I am going to give myself 3 months from today to build 2000 subscribers and as you suggest I am going to set actual dates for ladder rung 1, 2 & 3 and put them in my planner.

Your advice of starting with simple 1:1 consulting offering is absolutely what I need to do and is perfect for my business for all the reasons you outline so i am going to start with this and just stop everything else and do all of the things you mention to get to my MVA. Not only will I really be able to help others one-on-one, I will be really able to fine tune what works for them, what products they really want but get to work with real clients in the meantime. Perfect!

I note in the comments that you say you don’t need to build a whole sales page to start offering your consulting – so I will do this too – I will put something simple up on my blog to get started and use my content and responses in forums/answers to comments etc to convert people.

Also, I will unsubscribe from all of the other blogs etc that keep me sidetracked from my goal at the moment and instead find a few forums or places where I can reach out to others and develop a following.

I feel so inspired that I can now get to where I want to be by keeping it simple.

Thank you so much guys.

Grant Gipson

I loved this episode! I am in the process of starting my blog and it can be daunting and discouraging at times. Clay really encouraged me by making the whole journey seem much more attainable! Thank you!!

Marketing Accomplice

Lately I’ve been using Facebook as my conversion tool of choice. As trendy as it is, nothing helps you connect with your tribe more than the ability to see groups people engage in, laser precision in terms of demographics, and constant exposure to new eyes. Great podcast Clay and Pat. Enjoyed it very much!

Great episode Pat and Clay. Awesome stuff Clay! I really like the focused approach. Right now I have an audience of about 600, and I’m still on ladder rung 1, trading time for money with consulting. My business is helping people create legal second suites in their homes. My main source of conversion at this point is blogging. Any help would be appreciated on how I can scale. Thanks!

Tim Whiteman

Thanks Pat and Clay. That was a great episode. I think my #1 conversion focus is going to be a vlog utilizing YTube. I feel my must have clients will want video with screen share, etc to explain content. I will give Drip a serious look. Especially after BH huge deep dive. Would love LeadPages. Take care guys!

The one conversion mechanism that I am going to focus on is a sales page because I feel comfortable with writing and it’s what I personally buy from.

Ben Shatto, PT, DPT, OCS, CSCS

RyanKangail

Wow! This episode is exactly what I needed. I was at a stage where I had a million ideas going on and recently came to the realization that I had to go for one! And go hard! Thanks for the extreme value Clay & Pat. I actually saved this episode and am listening to it for a second time right now.

As for my one thing, I’m going with a sales page. I was contemplating that or a webinar which I would be trying for the first time, so think a sales page will work better. It will be selling a course which I have yet to build but that’s ok. Just getting started on finding my 2000 first email subscribers.

Again, thank you!

Ryan

angelakay016

Thanks for the great show today! I love SPI for all the actionable advice. I’ve been a handmade seller for 10 years now, and 8 of those have been full time with no other income source. I get so many questions about how I’ve been able to make full time living and buy a home with income I make selling handmade products. Most of my stories and advice are anecdotal so I would use blogging as my one delivery vehicle. Thanks again! – Angela

aija

This podcast has given me the courage to start a blog…a dream I really have been clinging to and had given up hope on doing. I feel I can now see the way! Thanks guys!!!

Really, really fantastic show guys. I am JUST starting to build an audience to share how to use marketing automation platforms like Drip to make the post-purchase experience awesome for customers and business owners. My best experiences as a consumer (those were I become a PROMOTING, lifelong customer) are those where my expectations are exceeded and I know the business owner has thought through each step of my experience after collecting payment and delivering the goods.. Problem is remembering to DO all the steps is tough for business owners without the right tools…but they’re out their. When I’m ready to launch my conversion mechanism will be a sales page.

Thanks for the wonderful information. I realize that I have been spreading myself way to thin and need to rethink a few things!

Blogging is how I spread the word and think that would convert best for me.

Power1024

Super Awesome discussion and great layout of a plan to help people succeed.

My ONE place that I will focus on traffic is Facebook.

Thank you Pat and Clay for the great contribution.

Kirsten Oliphant

I like webinars and joint ventures, but I’ve found that people are getting SO TIRED of webinars. Mostly, I think, because so many people are doing them poorly and not conveying value. It’s like a long sales pitch. Or a pre-recorded one pretending to be live (loved your advice to disclose if you’re automating!!). I like the idea of partnering with people to do jv webinars where you’re able to collaborate, connect with a new audience and still have the energy of a live training. Thanks for this episode!

This is my first comment on SPI (and actually my first comment on any blog). My only reason for writing is to say thank you. It is long overdue. For the last 4 years your podcast and personal brand have been my inspirational business partner. Your knowledge, insights, and integrity have helped me turn my side business into an extra $50k per year for my family. Because of you, my wife gets to stay home and raise my little boys.

Additionally, I commend you for your transition into education and philanthropy. As an educator myself (by day I am a dean at a high school), I know we need more entrepreneurs like you to help improve the system.

Lastly, thank you for the inspirational episode. After listening to it, I have officially decided to move forward with my newest business venture. I want to coach and inspire teachers to open side businesses just like I did. I hope to help them utilize their summers and late nights to provide more value to the world and earn some level of financial freedom along the way. My plan is to provide value via a blog and podcast and then use webinars to sell products. My original idea would be to sell online courses or coaching, but I will choose that once I find my future tribe’s pain points. Clay, I will pay you back by recommending LeadPages to all of my future teacherpreneurs.

God bless you both.

Jessica Bohannon

Thank you for the step by step guide for transitioning a blog to a 7 figure business. I’m going to implement some of the changes to my existing blog now, like focusing on one topic!

Barbara Craigie

Wow!! I am brand new at this and just got my site up last month. I have a whole 7 email subscribers ( and 2 of them are mine from the testing phase 🙂 ) This podcast has gotten me so excited about the possibilities. Thank you for giving us such a point by point plan. This is exactly what I need to move forward.
Pat, have been loving your content. Thank you so much.
Clay, I don’t know if you will reach your goal with exceeding the number of plays for this podcast as I am now going to go back and listen to the earlier podcast. 🙂 Thank you for sharing so much information. I can hardly wait to dig into the guide.

I realized I forgot to list my one way to gain customers. I am planning on using Facebook as this is where my target audience seems to be hanging out.
A question though is about SEO as an option. This seems like a foundational piece that needs to be in place. While it would drive traffic, is this enough? Would doing SEO and Facebook violate the 5 ones rule?

Thanks,

montreal6759

Hi Pat and Clay
I’m trying to figure things out and this podcast helped a lot to crystalize the essentials for me. I’ve been earning a living online since 2010, but I have definitely been stalled on rung 1. I would really like to find a new audience and reignite some passion in what I do, but I have been searching for an audience/niche for months and I keep coming away frustrated and unable to find a group or topic that’s not saturated. I’ve downloaded your free course and I’m going to be documenting my assumptions and options and start moving forward.

Eric Y

One of the single greatest episodes of any podcast I’ve ever listened to. Amazing.

My conversion mechanism will be using high value information packed webinar with a soft sale conversion pitch. I can’t wait to take what I’ve learned here and help refine this funnel.

Elian Tyson

What a great episode. Such great content. Thank you! I plan on using a traditional sales page.

My conversion method will be a sales page. I am not so sure about offering a single product. I’m growing a facebook fan page now on a fairly broad subject. But at the same time it is somewhat of a niche, it’s pretty much everything about lakes in Michigan. Response is good so far, I have less than 200 followers but engagement is pretty good, I have a feeling this will only get better as it grows. I also have a website/blog. I am thinking about various lead magnet ideas, anywhere from a best unknown hiking spots by lakes e-book to a fictional story series taking place in the wilds of Michigan. The original concept was to grow a fan page and then market tee shirts, etc. I’m thinking of some other ideas, so I plan to test them out. We’ll see. My main focus now is to grow it, and start getting people to the blog and sign up. But I certainly need that lead magnet!! I hope I win a membership to LeadPages!

So much value in this interview. Glad I find time to listen til the end.

As beginner in online marketing, it’s true that learning different traffic sources/conversion mechanism is so overwhelming. I got result doing them but not as much as I wanted. I feel that I will be more efficient if I just focus in one strategy and master it before jumping to another.

Since I still don’t have big budget to invest in paid ads which I tried before, I’m focusing now on Instagram as traffic source and Landing page/Sales Page as conversion mechanism. Hope I find the courage to try webinar next year.

Thanks Pat and Clay for this podcast.

Alida ‘n Corey Quittschreiber

Thank you Clay (and Pat for hosting)!! You have no idea what a blessing and perfect timing this was. I’ve been meditating about the desires of my heart (paying off my house, abundance, more peace and more time with my family) but I’ve been feeling really confused and defeated about direction. 3 years into my blogging journey and I’ve been at a brick wall for the past year. I’ve downloaded the resource and will be working on it this week!!

I do have a few quick question though if you have time.

I feel strung between rungs and am wondering where I need to backtrack to, to do it right. I already have over 25,000 moms on my list (with just under a 20% open rate), I’ve already made the amount you should make at the end of Rung 2 (I made over $9000 month 14) and I have 2 products that I’ve created but I’ve reached a plateau since – a large portion of my income was sponsored posts (not passive and I’m starting to do less) and ads and not my product sales.

The tough spot I’m in right now is choosing what product to focus on. Of the 2 products I’ve already created, the first one is a really helpful in-depth course but it’s only of interest to a small portion of my audience and I’ve come to realize I’m not as passionate about it as I thought and doesn’t quite fit what I feel my sites intent is.

The other is a self-published book, that needs some major updating and then marketing but potentially could help anyone in my audience. The 2 questions I have about this products are:

1. Does a low cost book have the capacity to lead someone to Rung 3?
2. And what are your thoughts if the book focuses on marriage/date ideas while the intent of my site encompasses improving all the relationships of a family oriented mom: marriage, kids and their personal self.

Or should I do some soul searching and consultations with my audience and see what they really need (I’ve never done that before). What are your thoughts on the best of the three product options and should I restart Rung 2 once I have the 1 product narrowed down?

Also, I’m fairly new to mediating and would love to hear the best place to learn how to mediate for beginners?

And to answer your question: Once I have the product I *think* I want to go with Webinars with Q&A format and if the topic fits my husband I’d love to convince him to webinar-it-up with me! Webinars would help me instantly see if what I’m doing is working or not.

Thank you very much Pat for this episode! Great timing. I really needed motivation because I want to start my own website.

My main conversion method? I believe in a great landing page. Good product should self itself. All you need to do is to present it properly to audience. Sometimes it is hard to people to imagine how a product can change there lives and the purpose of a landing page is to make a story. It’s all about storytelling.

Jolene Blackbourn

A+ episode! I’ve been looking into a webinar. Right now I’m giving speeches to funnel traffic to me but that limits me to after work hours and local venues. It looks like webinars are the way to get more clients for my one-on-one consults and my online course.

Le Bonheur DIY

Hello guys, I recently started my own journey with http://www.lebonheur-diy.fr and this has been so valuable for me. As Clay was mentioning at the beginning of the podcast, this is definitely much better than any paid stuff you could find online!
I’m still in the 1st phase of my business development and trying to build it up and you helped me to realize that I was focusing too much on the product rather than my audience. I also made the mistake that it would be easier to sell than to get new subscribers… Well… I guess that’s the way you learn!
Anyway, thanks a million times for these valuable information, this will for sure help me to reach my goals much faster!

Hi there,
Thanks for the great insights and ideas. I’m a musician from Germany and just starting witha new project. So I it’s going to take some time till I’ll get to the 2000 subscribers. But my conversion mechanism is going to be a podcast.
Have a great day.
Wieland

Thanks Clay and Pat! This was super helpful!! I’m working on building my list, which has been tiny for a long time as I have not really had a strategy. I love the idea of setting up a Google alert and answering any time you’re mentioned, assuming you are mentioned lol. I’m in personal development (like you started out doing), but my focus is on animation videos. I would focus on converting people via videos, but I’m still building my list. So that’s my focus.

Hey guys thanks for the show!
I plan to convert members of my audience into buyers by using automated webinars at the top of my sales funnel, with an email sequence.
I’ve been doing live webinars lately using Youtube live and Leadpages (makes it so easy, thanks for thatr) and they are really a lot of fun and get a great response from viewers. I am sure an automated webinar feature will outperform a typical email sequence.
My concern however is that automated webinars appear as though they are live, even though ‘live’ is never mentioned anywhere. But this feels disingenuous- everyone doing these knows that the viewer probably thinks it’s live, that’s why they have to select what time they want to watch and register etc. It’s designed to give that illusion.
What do you guys think about this? Clay I noted you said we should “probably” tell people it’s not live… but that probably sounds like you are on the fence also?
Thanks again!

Terry Jackson

Hi Clay and Pat thanks fo the truly amazing podcast I learned a ton of stuff. I am new to Pat’s podcast this is only my second epioside and I am hooked. I have just recently got Leadpages and I am doing the get started lessons right now and I have also signed up with Drip. I look forward to getting it all setup.

Now to my plans. I am new to all this and only started my blog 4 months ago and have very little traffic as of yet but I am posting weekly. My email list has not started yet but I have my Lead magnet, thank you page and optin page setup and an working on starting my funnel in order to build my list. My blog is a site dedicated to Health and Fitness for older people and is aimed at helping older men and woman build and retain muscle mass as they age in order to slow down the affects of aging so they can live more poroductive and enjoyable life. My main traffic source will be my blog and I hope to drive traffic to it with my Facebook page and group I setup for it. I plan to write a ebook detailing my exercise routine, meal plan and tips from my journey losing 75 pounds after years of struggling with my weight. Thanks again for the great podcast and I am currently listen to #78

NicK

Hi there Pat and Clay! Thanks for all your help and advice on your podcast – very clear and to the point 🙂 I’m in the beginning stages of my online business journey. I’m a journalist but want to help people write their life stories for their family and friends. I love people’s stories and think they are so interesting but teach us so much too. I’m well into my website construction and preparing about 10 blogs in advance. I’ve also made a short lead magnet video to give away. I have ‘validated’ my idea with my avatar and have a small list of about 12. I like Clay’s idea of offering a 30min consultation to start. Ideally I’d like to have an online course or virtual writing group. Will depend on what my audience wants! Slowly slowly 😉

I learned a lot from this podcast / training. I’m realizing I am kind of all over the place without a specific plan in mind to climb up the ladder. Thank you so much @claycollins:disqus for your knowledge and wisdom, I think this is really going to help me out with my business.
My main goal is workshops/ online trainings, I think I’m going to start with webinars to drive this traffic. You really helped lay this out for me! This is a great step to help with my blog at PositiveInfluenceNetwork.com

Grant Cregger

What an awesome podcast! Thanks pat and clay for all of your words of great wisdom. I’m still in the brief planning stages and plan to take action soon but plan on using the topic of empowering those new to the workforce on how to go from the bottom of the totem pole to becoming professionals. I’ve had the opportunity to start from the bottom of the construction industry and impress and imprint myself into company’s to better both them and me. After traveling this path that I have I have a burning desire to help young aspiring professionals make the necessary choices and take the steps to grow and become the professional they desire to be. So in a not so brief explaination 🙂 that’s how what I plan to build my MVA around! Hope you’re having a great week!
-G

Hi Pat,
This is my first comment on SPI (and actually my first comment on any blog). My only reason for writing is to say thank you. It is long overdue. For the last 4 years your podcast and personal brand have been my inspirational business partner. Your knowledge, insights, and integrity have helped me turn my side business into an extra $50k per year for my family. Because of you, my wife gets to stay home and raise my little boys.

Additionally, I commend you for your transition into education and philanthropy. As an educator myself (by day I am a dean at a high school), I know we need more entrepreneurs like you to help improve the system.

Lastly, thank you for the inspirational episode. After listening to it, I have officially decided to move forward with my newest business venture. I want to coach and inspire teachers to open side businesses just like I did. I hope to help them utilize their summers and late nights to provide more value to the world and earn some level of financial freedom along the way. The one traffic source I’m going to focus on is content marketing. The one conversion mechanism I’m going to double down on is webinars. My original idea would be to sell online courses or coaching, but I will choose that once I find my future tribe’s pain points. Clay, I will pay you back by recommending LeadPages to all of my future teacherpreneurs.

God bless you both.

Hayley Akins

Hi Clay and Pat. Great episode really helpful outline. I’m definitely going to use this path to start my business after I finish validating my idea through Will it Fly. I’m a freelance animator and I’m really passionate about and having my own business. So I want to create a site and products that help freelance animators and motion designers to run successful businesses. I’m going to be reaching out to my current network and giving away some free content. I think having people out there running there own businesses is fantastic and it’s quite tricky in such a creative industry so I want to help people to be successful.

Jeph

Hey guys, thanks so much for this episode. Really helped me give myself some honest evaluation of where I’m at and what I can do to get to where I want to be. I will be using a sales page as my main lead magnet. However, most of my clients come from relationship building on my social media platforms. So I feel the sales page will be high conversion because those that go to it, will be people I’ve already sold on it in DM’s or email. So maybe that’s one on one?
Either way, love the practice of patience, it’s been true for me too. Slowly but surely.

Thank you so much for this meaty podcast. Because I am a speaker (switching topics), so in the long run I’m the product. EBooks and coaching will support this. I plan to use Video to convert my audience (after the audience is built) My blog will focus on grief recovery and empowerment. There are subsequent topics that niche within this area I’m holding close right now as I establish myself as a leading voice.

Seth Schwable

VIDEO! VIDEO! VIDEO! VIDEO!
This was one of the best podcasts I have heard on SPI. I bought Pat’s book, Will It Fly, read it and loved it but I had difficulty validating my product. His interview with Clay helped clear some things up. I was trying to launch a math app several months back only for the revenue. My passion is writing and video, though, and by answering the question regarding conversion process (video), it became crystal clear 1. Who my audience is and 2. What type of business I am willing to invest the next two- five years of my life towards building. I already have video expertise so this is the best way to market my business. Congratulations guys on such a successful episode!

Thanks for an episode filled with actionable information and realistic approaches to building an online business, This is one of my favorite SPI episodes to date.

I’m currently building my audience in Rung #1 and entering Rung #2. I have been a LeadPages customer for two years and am building my audience through blog post PDF lead magnets, plus a lead magnet excerpt from my eBook “Pitch Your Best!” I will be leveraging LeadPages as I publish my next book “Pitch With Purpose: What to Do Before During and After You Pitch to Maximize Your Opportunities” (PwP) in September. PwP will have an associated online course.

I will be using a combination of sales pages and webinars to promote the course as I believe it will effectively reach my audience, entrepreneurs who are now or will be pitching their business to potential investors, partners, employees and even family members.

Thanks again for such useful information and direction.

Rick

ken

I’m currently building an audience through YouTube by creating engaging and instructional video series about creating 3D models intended for video game development. I am currently creating a short free course on getting started with the 3D modeling software Blender (What I use on my YT channel) along with access to a 3D Design student community (Bonus). This will allow me to collect emails and build that precious email list and will then allow me to market higher intermediate/mastery level courses. So I would save overall my pillars are YT channel (Traffic Source) -> Free Intro Course/Email List (Conversion Mechanism) -> High Level Course (Product).

Can’t wait to roll out my free course to collect email’s and build up Rung #1!

Clay & Pat – You guys ROCK, the value you’ve provided just connected ALL THE DOTS for me. A few years back I tried selling an ebook for lawn maintenance / care using affiliate marketing and my own product page via facebook but got Zero sales :-(. I’ve since moved on to other things but really need to leverage technology the way you explained in this podcast. My plan to reach my new goal of ~2,000 minimal viable audience is to create a YouTube channel which adds true value. I’ve done this before with a topic I was passionate about in years past but now I have new interests which I believe I could turn into another ebook or even a membership site. Thanks for the great value in this podcast! Keep ’em coming!

Clay climbs the leader board of most popular episodes on SPI. Ever! Thanks to both of you for providing so much value to me on this journey towards independence. I like how a lot of what Clay said in this episode validates the things I’m learning in Smart From Scratch.

This episode was just what I needed to hear to remain steady in going inward and working on growing my business without all the shiny penny distractions. I’ve felt called to do just this and use the information I’ve soaked up over the years to build my business, but it is hard when bombarded with all the experts (and so called experts) out there right now.

I started with my products and building my site first (launched 5 months ago). Now that I have I totally see how I could (and should) have started building up my audience before I was ready to sell. Yet I ignored all the advice to that told me to start before I’m ready. Well I will listen to this advice and focus on building up my email list to 2000 and not focus on selling as much right now.

Even though I want to try so many different tactics to build my list I’m going to focus on blogging weekly. I sell a physical product, aromatherapy candles, but I want to get into passive income down the road such as digital downloads or a course based around self care and mindset work. This stuff is quickly becoming my passion, but I haven’t honed in on my specific niche yet. I know when I start blogging this image will become clear with time and engagement from my audience.

Thanks for the insightful episode Clay and Pat! I’m off to download the material now so I don’t quickly forget the content of this episode.

Incredible episode! Within the first 30 minutes, I had already forwarded it to several of my friends / running partners. I had been struggling with decide on my “One Thing” — funnel creation to support my services, course creation or starting my youtube channel. I was already half way through creating my online course when I decided to reflect and make sure I’m going about this in the right order. After some reflection and discussions with mentors, I was leaning toward the YouTube channel, knowing that I needed an audience first, but wasn’t totally sure if this was the right choice. This episode has officially solidified my route.

So to answer the question you posed at the end of the podcast — I’ll be using video (through YouTube) as my one conversion mechanism! Downloading the worksheets now.

U’ilani Pisano

Awesome podcast Pat and Clay. When I get an audience I will be helping the Cosplay community. I think I would like to use a sales page as my 1 conversation method.

You spoke right to me with the webinar idea, so if I can figure out how to do it, that will be my conversion mechanism of choice as I launch my product end of this month! Thanks so much to both of you!

Kristen Riggle

Hi Pat and Clay! WOW, thank you for taking the time and effort to create this episode. There is so much valuable information here, I’m going to have to listen to it again!

I’m still on the first rung for my lifestyle blog, homeyhomey.club. In order to convert visitors into subscribers, I plan to create a landing page with up to 3 content upgrades that I can direct people to!

Thank you for sharing your amazing energy and creativity.

All the best,
Kristen

Cindi Gay

I created a website years ago, got my email list and now a course. It is all cobbled together. Now my husband needs to retire for medical reasons. The pressure is on. I don’t want to give up what I’ve worked on to go get a “regular job.” I need to make this happen but I’m running out of time…..

Going to listen to this again.

Cindi Gay

I am converting buyers doing a free online class each week. It has done wonders to build trust. I’m seeing a direct connection. I’m struggling with organizing my landing pages and email collection forms. That is on my to do list for this summer.

Daniel Stephens

THANK YOU For such an awesome podcast!!! For rung 2, my #1 traffic source will be a weekly vlog, my #1 conversion mechanism is going to be a 4 part Jeff Walker style launch sequence, leading into a $7/month membership site on having great relationships (my 1 product).

Cheryl Osler

Thanks so much for all the helpful information Clay!!! I help women over 45 get fit again and right now have a PDF that I’m using to get email subscribers that is called 9 Easy Ways to Change Your Daily Routine and Look Better where I give some useful things to do during the day to get your metabolism up.

RB

Great information, thanks for giving so much value. I want to start a blog focused on marketing for healthcare professionals.

Thanks again, Rob

RB

thanks for the great info, and giving so much value! Awesome episode. I want to start a blog on marketing for health care professionals.

Thanks for the good stuff. I use LeadPages and use a single video sales page. I need more time as I am working three jobs. I have 3600 subscribers and have about 25-30% open rate.

Rob Tong

Hi Clay, great advice. However (and I may be in the minority), I actually felt sad after listening to your interview. The reason is that you and Pat both mentioned something like 6 months to get to 2000 subscribers. I’ve been working hard on my niche site for 1.5 years and only have a quarter of that. I don’t know if I’m supposed to surmise that I’m a failure now? I don’t think so b/c I know of entrepreneurs who also took a long road to success.

My guess is that for every Clay Collins, Pat Flynn, Chris Ducker, Tim Ferris, etc who quickly built a big following, there are hundreds of others who see a much slower growth curve. But the interview just assumed everyone would (should?) be out of Rung 1 (and onto Rung 2) in 6 months, and that isn’t the case for me. My small-ish audience is passionate and based on email feedback, my site’s message is resonating with them. But part of me feels dejected that I don’t have well over 2000 subscribers by now…unless I misunderstood what you and Pat were saying? I have a youth baseball coaching site and am now developing practice plans, which my audience has asked for. Any additional thoughts on the timeframe for Rung 1? (I do love the rung analogy and the concept of laddering up, btw.)

M Cruzie

Hey Pat and Clay,
Another fantastic episode, I am a huge fan who is getting serious about starting an online income. I an currently not selling at this point. I have just started building my website and will be shortly launching a blog/vlog teaching people find their “flow state”. I want to teach people to get their life to a flow state as well.
The conversion mechanism that I plan to use at this point is sales page/video. I believe this would work best for my skill set at this moment and I think that people that are going to be interested in my content will resonate stronger with this form of selling.

Thank you for the podcast! Great to hear things in black and white, it instills a lot of confidence in moving forward with my online business idea.

I will focus on doing free webinars to show people how to use modern health technology to better understand and make wise decisions regarding their health. I think that people would really open up to the possibilities if they are able to see how to best take advantage of these tools.

Hey guys. Thanks a lot for providing so much value. I’m Tom from Australia… I currently have an email list of just over 400 and am really focusing on growing it to 2000 as fast as possible. I plan on using my blog (as well as social media presence) to drive people to the lead magnet page where I capture their emails. I will then focus on giving lots of value through emails and incorporate some marketing into that. Thanks for your passion to help young brands like mine, keep up the great work

Alex

Hi Clay,
I have listened to this episode time and time again for last couple days, and it completely chanced my view on many things about business.
As you have the opportunities to see and talk to so many successful online businesses using leadpages, you have much different and sometimes counter-intuitive views about how people should start a new business. I have been listening to entrepreneur podcasts from SPI, mixergy and EOF in last few years, but I feel you see things at clearer and higher level than other entrepreneurs.
Just as you said in the podcast, my biggest problem is I have been pulled at different directions. I have managed to cut down to only 3 things that I want to do in next 12 months. But after listening to this podcast, I decided to stick with just one thing that is my true passion.

Thanks,
Alex

Rupert Bassadone

Brilliant episode; thanks so much for being open and genuine.

I’ve listened to the podcast twice already and I’ve started my third listen.

The enthusiasm is engaging, and actually, Clay, your approach to this episode is actually the very definition of your and Pat’s methodology; give great and genuine support and advice and people will trust you and want to know more; and pay for it.

It’s created a genuine feeling of trust about Lead Pages, which until this episode I’d never heard of. Nailed it!

First I want to say a big thank you Clay. Right now I have too many sticks in the fire. So after your guidance I’m falling back to one passion for now. It’s in the IOT world or Internet of Things. Simple put I will provide information of how to interface any type of sensor or control device to your own private Cloud. The uniqueness is to provide instructions where even a 12-year old can run their own IOT Cloud service controlled either by a web or mobile app. Target audience are DIYers, learner techie, small businesses and those who want to avoid paying data fees by running their own IOT Cloud.

Clay, my plan is to follow the same method you used to start Leadpages by reviewing IOT Clouds and projects. Comment on what was done right or wrong and provide a simple app to copy their function that my viewers can gain access to after providing their email address. It will be all for free to viewers.

Later, there will be a paid Pro App available for those who want to take it to the next level with just a push of a few buttons.

Clay, I will use YouTube and screen cast to share my IOT project reviews and projects. Sometime I will have kids doing the reviews. Girls sharing their experiences, and business owners talking about the benefits of using IOT to fine tune their processes for profit.

I plan to have fun and go crazy with it. I already have started on making a lip sensor to monitor kissing. Every time you get a kiss it will trigger an arousing action.

I’m so excited to get started. I need to do at least two reviews a week for starters. However, doing a review a week will create better loyalty.

Well, Clay I’ll end here. Please return once in a while to motivate us.

Regarding “The Rule of Five Ones”, I’m only seeing three “Ones”: (1) Create one product/offer, (2) Create one conversion mechanism, and (3) Create one traffic source.

Can someone remind me what the remaining “Ones” are? THANK YOU!

Originally I was going to say:

(1) My product would be an e-book/audiobook.
(2) My conversion mechanism would be an awesome landing page.
(3) My traffic source would be Facebook/Google ads.

But after listening to Clay, I feel that running Facebook ads may not be the best way of finding (& connecting with) my MVA (Minimally Viable Audience). I need to connect with my audience in a more natural way.

Great insights! Thank you so much Clay and Pat. My big takeaway for mechanism was how important to focus on the building the relationships with the audience first before trying to sell a thing. I will be listening to this episode a lot more.

SaMonna Watts

This session was amazing! Thank you so much. I plan to use webinars as my conversion method. I think this is best because it’s more personal. I seek to help those who have experienced some of life’s greatest tragedies and disappointments turn their pain into purpose.

Lee Young

Ok, enough procrastination, time to get a wiggle on.
I’ve been looking/ researching for an online affiliate niche for my first attempt to start an online business. After about a week of trying to find something that I will be able to be passionate about and still easy to rank for I’ve finally bought the domain name and about to get hosting.
Lead pages would be handy too!
My single strategy is to use content driven traffic as this will be more useful to people in my niche and I’ll be able to recommend products off the back of my posts.
Thanks for everything you do.
Lee

Todd Welch

Thanks so much for the great podcast, very good information to help motivate to build a business. I have already started to build my list in the fishing space and have launched our first fishing product selling on Amazon. So far so good and I look forward to laddering up.

How awesome was this?!? Too bad I didn’t finish listening until Tuesday a week after, but this was just what I needed. Clay pegged my ADD-ness spot on. I have an authors’ site with over 3,000 members that brings in nada. Useless. I’m going to let that go and FOCUS on creating real MVA for my consulting business. My biggest takeaways are the 5 ones. Since I’m a writer, but also tend more toward the visual, I will focus on webinars as my best driver for traffic. No more multi-prong approaches that cause too much confusion and are difficult to upkeep. Pat, Clay . . . OUTSTANDING content!

MZ Lowe

Thanks Pat and Clay – excellent podcast and so many “value bombs” as Chris Ducker would say. I’m on the first ladder rung but in a different business space as a genre fiction author. However, the laddering concept, rungs and goals are very similar (maybe with a different timeline and $ expectations). That said, you challenged me to think beyond the $4 book and brainstorm additional reader experiences for the super-fans. Again thanks for your generosity. Here’s to making this the record SPI podcast!! 🙂

Liz LaBrocca

Clay, thanks so much for an awesome episode! I’m going to be using blogging to hit my 2k followers and it never felt so feasible! I love having an actionable goal and a clear idea of a time frame to put to use!

Jason @ eStoreCoaching

Great content Clay & Pat!

SPI, take action! You have plan now.

The one channel that I’m focusing for my online course will be implementing the jeff walker 3 part video series, funneling traffic from FB and then providing an offer…

OR maybe hold live webinar then a reply of that instead of the 3 part.

Anyone have comments?

Thanks, Jason

Hannah Rose

Thank you for SUCH an awesome podcast episode. I think I’m going to have to listen to this one a few times as there is so much good content. I am starting to build my minimum viable audience (currently have 141 subscribers). This episode gave me the push to take 3-6 months to reach a goal of 2021 (21 is my favorite number)… before launching the course I am currently working on. So, to build the audience, I will be focusing on weekly blog content and a bimonthly newsletter. Each blog post will have a free digital download with an ask for the email. I hope that will drive my numbers!!

Mike Addington

Wow, this was the first episode I’ve listened to after being recommended the podcast whilst on a stag weekend, what an introduction!! (The stag weekend wasn’t bad either but my head still hurts!)

I am going to start a blog to gain 2K followers. This episode has made my head spin even more with so many ideas, absolutely love the idea of laddering! Thank you from the Scotland!

That was a GREAT podcast! Does anyone know of people coaching this? I’ve been blogging for years, and haven’t seen results like this. I’d love to hire someone that can help me accomplish some of these goals.

I am working on a new project (an email newsletter) and I am planning to try a new combination of YouTube ads to get traffic (the target audience is very tapped into YouTube) + a giveaway contest to get people convert and give permission for follow-up – and then actively scrubbing the list after the contest to keep the ones most interested in the newsletter topic. That is my plan (different from what I have used in the past) and thanks Pat/Clay for the inspiration. I am a LeadPages annual member, but would love to have lifetime access if I was chosen ?

Michael Meyer

Pat & Clay, This was an interesting listen… Thank you!
Conversion mech: Video (The only way to have a consistent message, perfectly every time)
I am 19 months of bootstrapping into this with launch just a few weeks away. Your podcast and this kind of info is just so great for those like me. Very motivating to hear from those who have “done it.”
Thanks again
Michael Meyer
Founder (fancy way of saying “does everything”), RobinHoodPlans.com

Trent

Thanks Clay, great podcast. I’ve created a pretty good business online and I’m looking to step it up. I wish I’d heard this podcast years ago. What would you recommend to someone who’s already got a profitable business that didn’t necessarily do it in a streamlined way. For example, I didn’t start aggressively getting email addresses until about 5 months ago. I’ now getting about 500 per month. I sell about 40 different ebooks, so there goes the one product thing. I know this thing can explode, but…I think this question sums up my position. I’m all over the freaking place.

After listening, I’m thinking about creating one big product–an online class–and treating that like it’s my first product (I already have about 3500 engaged email subscribers) and putting my effort into that. Thoughts?

And even if you don’t answer this, no worries. Your podcast was the best one I’ve listened to and I’m sharing it with my friends who are designing their lifestyle, too. And I’ll be checking out leadpages, too. You provided a ton of value.

Clay & Pat thanks for an awesome episode. I learned a ton. I don’t have a MVA yet. My blog is dedicated to helping borrowers navigate student loan debt and choose the repayment option that’s right for them. As a first-generation college graduate there was no financial help for me so I worked two jobs and attended a public college to obtain my Pharm.D. and borrowed only for tuition and books. I borrwed $118,000 in federal student loans my debt was $128,000 by the time I graduated due to interest on unsubsidized loans.

After graduation I failed to refinance because I didn’t know it was on option. I didn’t realize it until I paid $14,000 in interest on my federal loans in 2015 and couldn’t deduct a dime of it and started searching for answers. I refinanced to half the interest rate last year but that mistake cost me $7,000 or more that could have been paid down in principal.

I don’t want anyone else to make expensive mistakes like that. I also want to fix our broken system for the common good. But I’m failing to connect with my audience. I’ve spoken with financial aid advisors at our local community college, I’ve written and self-published a book, I blog and have a Youtube channel (which I inconsistently post on, working on it though!), and my colleagues consistently ask for my help with their own loans. About six of them refinanced after talking to me, so people are interested in the topic but I’m not quite capturing the interest.

Long comment for a great episode, if you made it to the end thank you!

Adam

Hi Pat/Clay – Adam here from Australia, thanks for all the effort you fellas have put into this podcast and associated info – laying the path out like you have has literally been the step I needed to get me started! I’m in the beginning stages of starting a blog in the personal finance world – focusing on Responsible money management, Profiting with excellence & Generosity: as I truly believe (and have annoyed so many people over the years with this…) that a rounded yet simple approach to financial wellbeing coupled with a strong, and planned, commitment to giving-back is a sustainable and fulfilling way to grow your wealth right now, for under 35’s based here in Australia – a bit like it what you seem to be doing these days Pat!

Question for Clay: If you haven’t hit somewhere near the 2,000 MVA target within the first 3 months (and have been doing all the right things recommended by SPI, yourself etc), is it time to look at expand your niche? Or just get some pro-help on your content? (keeping in mind that Australia only has 13% of the US’ population)

Cassel

I have been using “webinar” format for over 5 years, but only to deliver pure content, for free (but they have to register), then, i offer the recording on my site for free for a month (but they have to register to the site), and THEN i put it behind the membership wall (or it could be purchased individually). I find that unlike other freebies on my site, this attract more “qualified” leads than other types of freebies!

Daniel Wu

I’m located in China and I use the app WeChat to convert my free contents to paid premium. So I put out videos of free infotainment, interviews and vlogs that helps people learn English. Then they come to my WeChat groups and we do leveled learning lessons. the paid premium is correction services based on those lesson. so they learn for free or very low costs lessons, then to verify what they’ve learned or practice and use what they’ve learned they need the premium service.

This was an outstanding podcast. It was so good I had to listen to it twice and I am still going to keep it in my downloads for future reference.

I struggle with the one focus/business/product/idea. It’s a terrible condition. But after listening to the podcast and others like it, I have been able to train my self to focus better!

Great show.

Thomas Dukeshire

Clay and Pat, Thanks for the valuable information. You are certainly an inspiration. I am ready to action on building my first MVA. I have multiple interests, skills and experiences that I want to share with others. My practical side is debating my passion side to decide on which specific idea to follow first. Is it as simple as asking yourself: “what would I rather be doing if I had my choice?” Also, is it a good idea to approach this first step on the ladder with a friend who shares your passion? Are there red flags that we should be careful not to ignore?

I feel that my first delivery method would be an engaging sales page on a small web site with two or three short videos communicating my mission, vision and passion. This web site would include a blog as well.

Best,
Thomas

Henry Serrano (Blue Ocean Safe

Great Information. I will be using Google adwords and had a because it has Worked. I spent about $120 and have had an ROI of $1980 that so far I can account for in my brick n motar business. Many physical business I think ignore this method but it does work for local business.

Kyle LaMotta

Pat and Clay, Thank you for delivering this awesome course – I learned a lot! After listening to the podcast I realized that I’m probably jumping ladder rungs without meeting the criteria (i.e. selling multiple products before establishing an MVA).

I plan to re-focus and simplify things, and will be experimenting webinars to convert my audience to buyers.

I’m a long time follower of SPI and LeadPages customer, both of which have added enormous value – thank you!!

Swamy G

I listened to your previous podcast with Pat (episode 78) and this one back to back. You make really good points that are insightful. But you also make it sound so easy, when in reality, I’ve found that the process of building an email list is pretty hard. I hope to incorporate some of the suggestions from both these episodes and build a minimum viable audience.

Here’s what I’m thinking of doing. My blog is targeted towards people who are debilitated by mental challenges such as anxiety, depression and disassociation (loss of touch with reality). I personally have gone through challenging times and now since I’m in a better place, I’d like to help others come out of holes that they’re stuck in.

To build an audience, I’m offering free consultation. It is 30-45 minutes of my time. I usually chat through Skype or Google Hangout. I believe this has helped people to get the support that they need. Even in those 30-45 minutes I have seen people leave with heightened hopes of recovering. In turn, I get to learn more about what kind of help someone is seeking and what areas of their life that needs improvement. Eventually, once I build a MVA, I hope to turn all of this knowledge and experience that I have gained from counseling clients into a video course.

Clay and Pat, this is hands down, the best breakdown of what I have been trying to figure out since 2012, when I retired from the USAF. I had just recently amassed over 1 million followers on Google+ as a musician and negotiated a ton of endorsements from companies like ESP guitars, Breedlove Guitars, D’Addario, Rees Harps and Mesa Boogie Amps. I tried to deliver an album but I was clueless and spent around 6k on a credit card to try and deliver. I failed. Once I realized I needed more knowledge, I started using my large following as a way to interview all my music heros, entrepreneurs, social media pros etc. I turned that into a podcast (thanks Pat and JLD!) for DIY musicians called Kingdom of Rock http://www.kingdomofrock.com I have grown my audience to about 40k musicians but a serious life event caused me to shelve the show for around a year so I lost momentum. After hearing your episode, I have decided to follow Clay’s Laddering up Plan with my partner http://www.amandabocchi.com I am going to document my process and put together a case study of exactly what I did for the next year. Here is my starting point> https://mattgibson.net/2017/05/03/matt-gibsons-website-revamp/ I would love to have either of you on my show as well. I have about 6 interviews in the can right now that Im launching on Monday. Let’s start a revolution and free some musicians from the 9-5!

John Vidas

Great show, and thanks for all the information! I’m focusing on converting members of my audience into buyers via informative blog posts and engagement.

I’m just planning a new project, I will use the MVA concept there. I run a small agency, we build software and IoT products for small and medium sized companies. Many of these companies struggle with the digital world, many of them existed for decades in the old, analog world.

We will start a podcast where we interview CEOs and C-Level execs about their learnings and struggles on the way to digital companies. I think the podcast will be a good marketing channel for the agency, but mostly I want to build an archive of great stories that helps these companies find their way into the digital world.

So, next step for me: Minimum viable audience for that podcast.

Bill Giovannetti

This is incredible material — I’m super thankful to you both. I’ve been binge-listening to the Smart Passive Income podcast, and it’s really a gift of grace. Thanks, Pat.

To answer Clay’s question: I plan to use Video as my one conversion tool. I’m pretty new to all of this, and it makes sense to me. My site will be dedicated to helping people thrive, rising above the craziness of life, and getting to a solid footing in life. Videos make sense for me, as I’m planning a video course on spiritual principles for personal wholeness and thriving.

I’m checking into Leadpages, drip.co, and I’ve listened to the Audiobook, Will it Fly. I’m doing the companion course now, so I’m psyched. Thanks again for the help.

Hi Pat and Clay, thank you for a great podcast! I learnt a lot! I’m a Polish living in France and writing a blog about Alsace, the region I live in. I’m planning to create a series of tourist guides which will be availabe at my (future) e-shop. My email list is around 800 subs at the moment, but I know now what goal I should be aiming to. My conversion mechanism is and will be a sales page.

Oh my goodness. Thank you Pat and Clay. This came to me at exactly the right time. I need to stop being impatient, and just focus on lead generation. I already have one product, so why am I trying to create more right now? I only have 900 people on my email list, and I need to get more people to buy my one product. I’m a little confused at a lead/landing page vs a website. I obviously need more clarification, and am going back to episode 78 also. Right now…I’m thinking my one traffic source is my blog. My one conversion mechanism is my landing page on my website (www.holisticchristianlife.com which needs help if it’s purpose is to sell.) This is really making me think and clarify things. Thank you!!!

Melanie Toner

Clay, thank you so much for this! It’s really opened my eyes to some of my missteps over the past few years. I’m curious about you suggestion to allow the audience to tell you what they want rather than leading with a product. Is it possible to do both at the same time? I have a list of around 1,100 and would like to launch a product this spring that is super focused (in the past I’ve been more general) and I would like to build the list as I grow but I wonder if I should focus the next 3-6 months on offering high value content to leads and focus on building the community before making the offer.

Taking your advice – My product will be a DIY course on how to reuse, re purpose, slice and dice your content as a means to avoid content fatigue while staying consistent in your posting. I’m going to focus on webinars as my conversion mechanism and paid FB traffic as my traffic source.

Bob Rombach

Thank you Clay and Pat!

I must say this episode came at the perfect time for me and I’m so thankful. I was about to pull the trigger on a competitor of Leadpages. But the ACTUAL VALUE

Matt KnowsThat

Thanks so much for the great content and episode. I’m in the very early stages of my next big business move, and hope to start off on the right foot and ladder up over the next few years. Clay and Pat, you guys are making HUGE impacts on people’s lives. Thank You.

Bryan Lessly

Clay & Pat,
Thanks so much for the great content. That was an hour and 20 minutes that flew by- well spent. Great information!
My background is in broadcast media. My business is creating a marketing vehicle for mom and pop businesses which we’ll partner with across the U.S. and eventually beyond.
The concept works on two levels- giving the retailer a free marketing / advertising service that is paid for by their future customers. The revenue generated by those future customers is what we use to provide value back to the customer through content creation, incentives to do business with our partners, and charitable giving. We plan to add customers through live video events and provide our business partners the ability to tell their amazing stories through videos we create. Each business partners also agrees to promote our membership.
Once we franchise, a small team (3-4) can use our system in their community and make (we project) $10k to $20 per month, depending on how hard they work.
We like the win-win aspect of that and believe in a mindset of abundance.
Pat, thanks for your work, you were the one person who introduced me to this world of entrepreneurship 3 years ago and it’s taken me so many places. Thank you. (P.S. – Used your book to help see if we had validation for our idea- we’re sure it will FLY!) And Clay, we have been a user of Lead Pages for two years now and it had helped many of our clients.

AWESOME INTERVIEW!!! Great information, I’m going to listen a second time!

Valencia Griffin-Wallace

I have listened to this episode so many times and can not take enough notes. It was such an action packed episode. Thank you for all the valuable advice Clay and Pat you have a life long fan. SPI is truly a valuable resource in my biz life! Have a great weekend!

One thing which I like about both of u is that you are down to earth and humble even with so much success.. I have started to implement strategy suggested in this podcast. Will use Twitter as channel and will provide discounted deals as lead magnet.. http://makingasmarthome.com/

Stephen Leung

Hi Clay thanks so much for an amazing episode! Super great info, and also reinforces me about being on the right path, because I’m in the middle of doing pretty much exactly everything you are describing in rung1, with the five-ones!

I have a question about that though. So here are my one’s:

one traffic source: facebook ads
one product: an online course
one conversion: this is where I’m unsure about

I’m almost finished with creating my product, and I plan to sell with webinars, since thats what many experts recommend to sell online course, I feel like that would convert quite well, and it works well with my traffic source (high enough ROI mean I can continually loop it back into ad spend)

However, I do a lot of content marketing as well (one blog post per week, one facebook live session per week, plus some useful videos here and there), and that would probably be good conversion mechanism (kind of as how you did it, answer question and recommending products as solutions to questions).

Does that mean I’m already doing two conversion mechanisms? Do you recommend that I stick with one of those two, and then either tone down on creating content, or don’t concern myself with webinars for the time being?

Brilliant episode. I built a side business two years and got to 6 figures in 13 months (www.getsos.net). But I’ve been distracted with other projects. Meanwhile the business keeps growing and clients don’t leave.
Listening to Clay go through the tiers has really motivated me to double down on this business.
Sales funnel will be our main marketing source (I will be dropping the others). Our goal is to go from $10K to $40K/month by December.
This has been a gift!

Grant D

Hi guys – thanks for the great episode! I’m working my idea (suburban/mainstream home sustainability) through Smart from Scratch, and this session was a great motivator and way to think of what my business could become. I’m planning on using emails as my conversion source; I’m constantly inspired by great emails from folks like Pat and especially Ramit (his are gold, even if he’s not selling something on that particular email!), and hope that I can live up to a fraction of their examples.

Thanks again – keep up the great work!

Amy Broussard

This was one of my favorite podcasts so far! Thank you so much for all of the actionable information in this episode!

Awesome episode! Thanks so much for all the valuable information. I blog and speak in the world of character-based coaching and athletics at http://www.coachwithcharacter.com. My target audience is mainly sport coaches (youth through college). I have written a variety of booklets, and I do presentations/workshops based on those. I am also a speaker/writer for a much larger organization in the same niche (over 600,000 followers on FB).

Because of the overlap/similarity of the names of our two companies/sites, I am re-vamping my website and will be changing it to greatresourcesforcoaches.com. I will be launching that shortly. Along with that launch, I am in the process of expanding two of my booklets (one for head coaches & one for assistant coaches) into a workshop that is supported by a single book. It will be focused on coaches working together and creating great staff chemistry.

I currently have an email list of 700 to whom I send my blog posts each week. I am torn on the conversion mechanism and traffic source to use. I have been wanting to add video into the mix (don’t have any on my site yet), since as a speaker, it would be good for people to see/hear me speak, and it is one of my strengths. However, I like the idea of webinars, too. I plan to start implementing Facebook ads to create traffic. Not sure if I am zeroed in on one thing enough, but I’m working on it.

Meredith

This was INCREDIBLE! Thank you both — Clay and Pat — for this educational and practical session; I learned so much! I’m nearing the end of phase 1 — I know my passion and have been actively growing an audience (on YouTube mostly, also IG and now an email newsletter) over the past 2 years. I’m now exploring my move into Phase 2, and this was incredibly helpful in getting me there! I really needed your advice, though, to focus on the ONE offer, so thank you for that reminder. As for the channel – deciding between YouTube (wide audience) and my newsletter (much smaller), but likely the latter for my most dedicated supporters 🙂

Paul Wootton

Great stuff! Thanks, Clay and Pat. As my go-to conversion strategy, I’m going to give webinars a crack in the near future. I know they’ll take a bit of practice but what better way to showcase your content and coaching credentials. That’s what I hope anyway…!

Chris Gilmour

Thanks Clay & Pat, This was a great one, so many actionable items and a great framework to work off of.

My one traffic source will be webinars and livestream. My conversion method will be a landing page.

Cheers!
Chris Gilmour

Adam

Hi Pat/Clay, thanks for offering such valuable content – as somone who has been an eager onlooker from the side-lines for a while now (all the way from Australia) this podcast and appending resources has just given me a kick-start. Im in the process of setting up my own blog with BlueHost (which is incredibly easy to use and effective!) on helping Australians make more money doing what they are passionate about. Question for Clay: If you have not reached 2000MVA in the first 12 months, is it time to expand your niche – or do something else?

Btw, I would love a chance at winning a lifetime membership to LeadPages. So here’s my attempt:

My conversion mecanism is an evergreen product launch. I followed Jeff Walker’s template and built it into an email sequence using Convertkit.

Ian

Great episode Pat, I’ve been listening for a long time (episode 2) and this is the first comment that I’m putting up. I’ve used the show wisdom and applied it to other businesses but now i’m motivated to start a blog/business. It will be at bigguydeals.com. Thanks again!

This is the best podcast I’ve listened to in a LONG time. I’m totally the ADD all over the place person you mentioned!! I love the 5 ones rule-going to start implementing that today. I have a lifestyle blog with a large following and a large email list but they aren’t the target market for the product I’m truly passionate about sharing (blogging related). I’ve been using Leadpages and optins for a while now to try and filter out the people in my audience that are interested in blogging related content and I love it. I’ll use sales pages for my conversion method.

Mia Johnstone

Hello. This was a fantastic podcast. Thank you. I plan on using webinar for conversion. I work with private schools and marketing. I loved that Clay said to focus on one item to sell. I’m quite ADD and learning through support and lots of meditation to stay focused.

@claycollins:disqus and @patwithspi:disqus … during the podcast, y’all recommend not creating a “product” as the first way to sell to your audience. But, I’m left wondering what your advice would be for a hobby blogger looking to convert the blog into a business? I have a very specific niche (pattern drafting for the home sewist), a pretty large list (6K), 800 students enrolled in free “lead magnet” mini courses, and an amazing leadpage/box conversion (50%) . . . I do decent with affiliate income, but..other than that, I generate no revenue. My audience seems hungry for online courses and demonstrations. In this case, would you recommend moving toward the online course business model? I’m afraid to take the leap. TIA

I’m going to convert my audience into buyers by offering amazing content upgrades and then send them to my e-mail sequence which provides more value…and eventually sell a product or course!

loupage

Hey Clay, definitely on rung #1, building that initial list. I plan to use my blog as a source of traffic. Thanks for your generous offer, would love to build that list using Lead Pages ツ.

Tony D. Morgan

So I’m making a game app at the moment and was looking for ways to monetize it when I stumbled upon a free pdf at bluecloudsolutions on the process of developing and releasing an app. So I took a throw-away mail adress and opted-in on their site (I always do this because I’m just interested in those pdfs, sry 🙂 ). But instead to all these other boring “welcome to the club” greeting mails, I was instantly taken to a video and the message “the document has been send, please allow 10-15 minutes for it to arrive. And that I absolutely have to watch this video before reading the pdf”. The video started immediately playing, I checked my mail – nothing there. So why not whatch it.

It was a great sales video for an indepth app marketing course. And there it just struck me how ingenious this was. I downloaded the pdf on the same topic, so I was definitely there target. Conversions on this must be huge. The price point was low: 7$. Affordable for everyone and that 5 minute video totally sufficed to sell it. On the order page (displaying a 4 minute timer btw) was an upsell for an app idea generator (probably coded in 2 hours) for another 7$ that was also a 1-time offer only in addtion to that course. In the end I didnt’t bought it, but the fact that I was on the brink of buying it despite only clicking on their website 5 minutes ago to download a free pdf, was just … I felt awesome to witness such a great sales technique. And I will definitely implement it on future projects!

Tiffany Carr

I have yet to hop on the ladder. I have been in the shadows waiting to start everything. Waiting for what? I don’t know. I have a website that is not launched, that frankly is beginning to look over designed. I’ve created content in the niche of teacher resiliency and retention. I have the experience and content knowledge to back it all up and plan to finish a book while building my MVA through blogging. I feel like I’m missing something or I’m not ready… not sure what my deciding factor is or what else I should have hammered out at this point. Thanks for the valuable podcast

John Shaffer

Great episode!

I am recording episodes and planning the launch of a podcast providing information and motivation for people with amputation. I plan to build my audience with Facebook and create a community for eventual product launch.

Hi Clay and Pat,
Love this podcast and esp this episode. The rule of five ones rings is a great one as each new variable multiplies the complexity of things. (Speaking from experience with my last business where I did lots of things ‘wrong’ but managed to end up with a good outcome and trade sale.)
I’m now starting again so this is timely for me. My idea is for a Saas product which I’ve tested inthe market with drawings but it’s hasn’t been built yet. Ive stripped the concept down to what I think are the bare essentials, but it’s still a big leap to get the first version built and released. I was wondering if you have any thoughts on an incremental step in missing??
Love your work, Fiona

Daryl Chow

I love the laddering up analogy! It really hones me in to think in stages, as I’m anxious to push to the next step too quickly.
I’m at ladder rung#1. What clay said about the five-1’s really struck a chord with me. Instead of trying to launch 2-3 products, I’d stick to one. And focus in on more content writing for blogs.
Really appreciate both clay’s and pat’s generosity. Thank you.

The conversion mechanism I’m going to focus on is webinars because I love to talk too – LOL – especially about my topic! Webinars because I love how much value they add. And they convert members into buyers well in my industry also. Plus webinars are a great way to add so much value and build relationships regardless of the purchase decision. However, I intend to add so much value a purchase will be a no-brainier! 😀

Great episode, Pat & Clay. With my site I’ve completed the first rung of the ladder, but haven’t put much effort into any sort of monetization. Given the nature of my website I expect that a landing page with an eBook or some other high-quality resource would be the way to go.

Judy Imamudeen

This was awesome! Thanks so much Clay for the insights and value given in the show. I am still standing on the ground, not really on Ladder 1 yet since I don’t have 2000 MVA, but what you shared definitely gave me more focus. Since I’m an educator, I feel that Twitter is my traffic source that I’ll start with. I was wondering where was the worksheet that you spoke about in the podcast? Thanks again!

Eric N.

My only conversion mechanism for my podcast – Courage Cast Podcast – will be a webinar. I will
Point out the core problem we all have – how to overcome fear in business – and convert them to an e-course.

Al Thomas

Pat and Clay thank you both for providing so much of your time and knowledge. I appreciate all that you do to help others.

Wow. Just Wow. Thank you Clay and Pat. This was just the episode I needed to hear at this moment in time. Funny how the universe works that way.

I’ve been creating content for home decorators for over 3 years and have about 2.5k email subscribers. It took a little longer than 3-6 months to get there, but Australia only has a population of 23million so it’s a smaller audience. But yay – I’ve already achieved step 1 on the ladder and that made me feel really good.

Then you said a good first product to introduce is freelancing/consulting, and I just did that in March without really realising it. I kept it nice and simple – I sell my interior design expertise one on one for an hourly rate. The information I am gaining from my clients is pure gold. I feel like this experience is my free copywriting course and business validation process for the course I am working on.

So now I see where I have to go and I am going to use the rule of 5 one’s to get there. My one source of traffic is SEO & Pinterest – 75% of my traffic comes from these 2 search engines, and my one conversion is a sales page with video. Video scares me but it is a really personal and authentic way to share your message. Thanks so much for creating this episode for us, Kylie ?

Saga Dalton

Hey guys great, great topic. I absolutely loved every aspect of this conversation of Clay and Pat and I wrote down everything so I keep going back and forth and analyze every topic. So much to learn from this but so much more if you really go into it. The most difficult part I think for a newer is to set the correct mindset. When we have guys like you to guide us our only remaining enemy is ourselves.

I want to transform the music space, equipping musicians with tactics and strategies for building a career that is both artistically fulfilling and financially sustainable.

I’m tired of the “starving artist” archetype and want to empower musicians to make a living doing what they love. I believe this will be good for everyone–everyone needs more great art!

I know that my personal strength lies in public speaking, so I will focus on video conversions, specifically through launches. The music world is event-based, and this makes sense for me as a conversion mechanism for that reason, and because it will complement my work schedule (I’m a university music professor).

Thanks Clay and Pat for sharing this valuable information. It has my gears turning.

I’m in the midst of starting a travel blog. I’m having big a hard time trying to figure out what niche I should choose. I’m thinking long term, couple travels but am not sure if that’s specific enough. I will be sending my current instagram audience of nearly 5000 and will decide on my first product once my blog is up and running and my audience “tells me” what product they want from me.

Melanie Beiler

So incredibly helpful, thank you, thank you, thank you! My conversion method will be webinars, as it helps me to start to give some deliverables and a “hook” for people to realize if I could truly be helpful and want more. I focus on small business communication, so webinars help me to start to demonstrate my communication skills and meet them at a basic level in order to demonstrate a benefit for further relationship

Daiana Neumann

Wau! These was the best podcast EVER! Believe me I am a podcast junkie, but after listen these one I just got clarity. Clay and Pat thank you so much.
Product : Online course for mums who want to start a business ( I decide for these because is my passion and comes very easy to me). Channel: Facebook, I am focusing on LIVE video. I realize that I am good at it and really enjoy. Traffic: FB ads, still learning how to do it. Sell: I prefer a sales page with a video. Launches are so exhausting, and I am not good at webinars. I am better at videos. Even thinking if I don’t sell from some LIVE webinar, but not with slides. It feel so cold to me. I prefer more face to face.

Once again, thanks for these amazing episode. Sure I will listen to it again. I already did 2x. 🙂

Amanda

I’m going to convert traffic via videos because I find it simple, and easy and I am very comfortable with that and it’s super easy to show people how to do things on video/screenshare. I am working on building a minimum viable audience as a Digital Marketing Strategist. Just starting this one! amandalong.me (not live yet) but on FB https://business.facebook.com/amandalongdigitalstrategist/

Renato Anderson Rosa

Thank you for a great episode! I’m planning to focus on a sales page due my type of audience. I am working on a blog that will be up soon.

AMAZING episode. Clay really laid out a great gameplan and now I just need to execute! No more excuses.

I’ve had a Disney/weddings blog for over 5 years now and I generate a little revenue and I want to start offering products, but it seems so daunting. Ebooks? Courses? Live coaching? I’m not sure where to start! After listening to this episode I think I need to really focus on growing my email list. Investing in Convertkit and Lead Pages are a next step. Thank you Pat and Clay!

Inspirational podcast! I’m still trying to get 2000 subscribers whilst suffering big time with ADD! So time to focus on content marketing and e guides for my vision of helping business’s with their stock and marketing photography (nickkatin.com). BTW, Pat, looking forward to hearing you speak in Melbourne. It’s a great place but not as good as the sunset coast (Western Australia). Hope you can get there sometime if you haven’t already.

Wow!! Awesome advice. I blog and coach/mentor Christian women after divorce (and abuse) to reclaim their lives and find healing. After a total rebranding last year, my focus right now needs to be rebuilding my list. I have an eBook but have too many conversions and traffic sources. Thanks for helping me map out my new course of action.

Hey Clay, if I had a partner or had the finances to hire people, would I be able to climb rungs faster using this model. If so, would you advise adding in resources to move up rungs at a faster pace?

Felicia Streeter

My one conversion mechanism is going to be Webinars! I’ve listened to a lot of Podcast shows and this one is by far the best information. Total game changer. Thank you both for sharing your wisdom. I will be sharing this episode with my family and friends.

I do have one Question: If my one mechanism is Webinars, then I shouldn’t try to do other things like speaking, social media etc? Can you explain that a little more?

Also on rung one, I am going to run a really valuable give away/contest of a niche product that only my ideal customer will love and be enticed to enter. Im going to cut all other forms of paid marketing and allocate that budget to giving away something of significant value. will promote on social channels and home page. Im assuming this is the fastest way to grow the list with my ideal customer target. Success will come from choosing the right product to give away so that only my ideal customer enters. the list will also convert better if successful.

One of the most informative and actionable podcasts I’ve heard. I cannot wait to get started! I have a website about developing confidence by learning important life skills such as organizing and setting goals, managing and grow wealth along with time-tested methods to learn quickly and effectively. The one method I’m going to use to grow my audience (even though I’m afraid of the using the platform) is Facebook.

Julian Canita

Hey Clay and Pat, this was a great episode. Thanks for this. I’m just about to get started and this is a really really helpful blueprint for me to work with. I’ll probably use Facebook paid ads as my one traffic source to a funnel where users can opt in to my list and later on can purchase my product because i find it as an effective way to get people to convert into a lead and eventually into a buyer since it works with me. I’m excited to get started, thanks guys 🙂

My data tells me that the video introduction to every post, product review, collaboration etc. is the key-conversion-trigger. This is by far the most valuable conversion-trigger!

Chuck Moorefield

Pat and Clay, Thank you both so much for providing such GREAT content! I am just starting out in my online pursuit, I’ve had a hard time getting traction because I haven’t been able to focus my efforts as well as I’d like. I joined Pat’s Smart from Scratch course and found myself getting stuck trying to validate my ideas. This podcast really opened my eyes that I’ve been trying to put the proverbial cart before the horse.

My niche is in helping people understand, maintain, reconnect and grow in their spiritual journey in practical ways (particularly in the Christian arena). It’s a passion I’ve had for many years and have been doing so offline for a long time. Since I’m just starting I’m still not sure whether I want to focus on content marketing or video marketing, but definitely one of those.

If either of you are still monitoring these comments I have a question. Does maintaining a Youtube channel and a blog count as 2 traffic sources?

This podcast helped me understand trying to make a living doing this has been so difficult. This will truly help me be able to focus more on serving my audience first by building a list then being concerned with monetizing. Between this and Smart from Scratch I have lots of actionable advice to focus my efforts on for the next few months.

I will definitely be focusing on a sales page with an embedded video as my conversion mechanism. This will allow me to share the passion I have for my product with my audience! Loved this podcast! Thanks Pat & Clay!

Great podcast! Like many others, this has convinced me that I’m spreading myself too thin.

My One conversion method will be my Facebook group, I’m already getting decent results from it, but don’t spend that much time on it because I’m spending time working on all the other conversion methods.

Jub Bryant

Awesome sauce in this episode.

Have been ‘travel blogging’ for 18 months or so now….really struggled with trying to find my niche but it’s starting to develop….sports related travel (I go surf for a month write about it, learn about obscure sports such as Silat in Malaysia).

Currently my list is 250 or so, but that’s from two separte topics (content upgrades)…New Zealand and Budget Travel…so not all are likely interested in sport…need to cull that list through giving them an option to stay subscribed.

Have a few posts on the blog that need to be published, but then I’ll be creating a post along the lines of ’20 sports you have never heard of around the world’. I’ll be able to promote this post a tonne (outreach to those who blog/participate in each of these sports) and feel like it’ll be a shareable post. Will ideally create a content upgrade for this post and that’ll be a primary driver to climbing rank #1.

I’ll definitely be focusing on content marketing as my conversation method. With my audience of art teachers, this is the best way to bring them in! Thanks for the great episode!

Richard

Thank you very much for this motivational talk! Your ladder framework showed me, that even a smal list of +600 subscribers is nearly 30% of the first step. Challenge accepted for reaching +2k subscribers within the next 2 months!

Ryan Peebles

Hi Clay and Pat, thanks a million for all the extraordinary value that you constantly give. I will soon be launching an online resource to help people with lower back pain which is my passion above all else as I have been through the experience. My website which is not launched is at http://www.ArtofCore.com and my other one for the training program is at http://www.CoreBalanceTraining.com. I will be using a webinar to attract and convert leads.

Jon Hiram Friedl

Mind blowing episode!! I’m a few months in on my business and, ultimately, it’s been confusing. I’m trying to do too many things. This episode makes sense of everything I’ve learned since I launched my website 7 months ago. See http://professorslots.com

My business idea is slot machine gambling, based on my personal experience of recently winning 90 taxable jackpots in 9 months, and then a luxury car. But that’s like giving annual revenue of your business – but what was your profit?? My profit was 30% more than my gambling expenses. I want to be genuinely helpful to my audience, but first I have to reach them.

Skip these details unless interested: Casinos are incorporating new enterprise software to significantly reduce their slot machine mechanic workforce and better manage the payout settings on 1000s of machines. Adjustments once done manually every 7-10 days are now automated to be done daily – but with automation comes predictable and clear patterns. This unique perspective added to lifestyle topics, safety, getting the most from players clubs, understanding the different gambling styles, etc. makes this business something useful and, I hope, profitable.

I have been spreading myself thin over 4 social media accounts. I’ve also focused on SEO and finishing/editing my 200+ page e-book. After listening to this episode today, I’ve taken down the book from my website and am working towards deciding upon a single traffic source until I have 2000 subscribers (Ladder 1). It’s tough to get my mind around the idea, but I now understand that spreading myself too thin is my main problem right now. Blogging, podcasting and vlogging are my big three possible traffic sources. I’m equally prepared to do any one of them. I’m thinking it may take a few days to figure out my choice.

Any thoughts or suggestions?

Jesse Seymour

This might be obvious to most people, but I am not sure I understand this. I am just getting ready to start an online business, although I still have to validate the idea using Will It Fly? first. So my plan should be then to do step 0 of validating the idea, then move to step 1 in this framework to build my MVA and start testing products that I think will do well based on my market research from step 0? I am definitely downloading this episode to my desktop so I can listen to it a few more times, because I am very interested in starting and growing an online business (and ending a 10 year streak of not getting any successes!)

This episode was truly eye-opening for me. I’ve always been a proponent of the KISS principle in life, and the Rule of Five Ones is perfect for me. I’m going to pursue this for one full year. My One Product will be my How To Study Poker Course, my One Conversion Mechanism will be webinars (already doing premium webinars but will offer free ones once my course is LIVE) and my One Traffic Source will be Facebook ads (but I’ll continue my weekly podcast as well of course). Thank you very much Clay and Pat!

Patrick Jackson

Interesting episode – and it’s focused one thing that I’d been using a scatter gun against with several ideas that could be executed – need to get back to just one at a time. @claycollins:disqus’ free course downloaded.

The conversion mechanism I’m going to be focusing on is engaging with the community of users in the market the product is going to be for – it’s a resource site for Joomla users – so I’ll be engaging on the existing forums, stack exchange, Facebook and linked in groups that I already participate in from time to time, but ramping that up will then create the conduit to the site to build my own audience.

The MVA will be generated around creating initially a blog of best practice solutions to making the most out of the Joomla CMS (one of WordPress’ competitors) coupled with a Google Custom Search Engine curating the best of the best resources existing on the web for Joomla… so the audience will be able to gain something straight away from the site as soon as they visit. Not something I’ve seen done a lot elsewhere.

From there, I’ll need to complete the other ones in the 5 ones – the actual product to monetize the site with is going to need some reading (actually, listening too) of @patwithspi:disqus’s Will It Fly – need to take some of my own advice there after telling someone else to go validate their idea this morning.

Lori Jockers

This episode was so incredibly helpful. I would say that my conversion method will be videos. I am technically going to have two business. The passive part will be my online childbirth education classes. I feel with videos though is that I can kill two birds with one stone. The videos will highlight the education course and a certain aspect of myself as a doula. I have a facebook page but that is almost exclusively for the doula portion of my business.

I’ve built an audience of a little over 40,000 goalies on Instagram, I did leave a comment a few weeks back on the leadpages blog talking about conversion rates–so my input here might not necessarily be “how I’m going to convert” but, “here’s an idea of how somebody without experience can convert”.

So, a little over a year ago when I started my account (it’s @goaliecoaches on Instagram), I had ZERO base to stand on in the goalie coaching niche.

Fast forward a year, I’ve got 40k followers there, 6-7k on Snapchat, a couple thousand person FB group, AND most importantly I’ve been able to convert 6-7000 people using LeadPages alone from my Instagram bio, into EMAILS.

The punchline is this. I didn’t ask for an email until 10k Instagram followers. I didn’t siphon my audience until 30k or so on Instagram. It takes a ton of work, this isn’t going to work for everybody but it makes a heck of a story to tell and I think it’s an interesting, a-typical route vs. starting with a website/blog.

Just launched my first product January 1, 2017, it’s going well however I cannot attest enough to having patience.

For somebody out there who may be wondering how to generate traffic on the internet, providing a ton of value for free using social media might be a great place to start.

PS. I’ve been crushing it using Drip, took me a bit to figure it out but that’s a sweet product.

PPS. I once applied for a job at LeadPages and got rejected. Blessing in disguise.

Keep it up both Clay + Pat, this was the first podcast episode I’ve listened to from you (@patwithspi:disqus) in a bit and I’m happy I did. Also, Pat, if you read this, I actually got the motivation to start GC from meeting you at the first ever Converted conference in Minneapolis.

Lastly.. if anybody reading these comments has gotten this far, I would love to answer ANY questions you might have. I believe I can provide a ton of value, I don’t have a 7 figure business to stand on, but I do have a cool conversion story to tell using LeadPages + Social Media and I’d love to pass this “knowledge” along or help anybody out. I’m sure you can figure out how to get a hold of me, just say you found this comment here.

Jordan Berry

Thanks to both of you for the great master class! I loved the reminder to stay laser focused on the most important things at the right time and the systematic way in which you laid everything out, Clay. I was able to sit down and modify my business plan to incorporate your laddering up strategy. Thanks for asking great questions for us, Pat.

I am going to focus on one-on-one phone calls as my conversion mechanism. I have a young blog aimed at hopeful and current laundromat owners and investors looking to capitalize on the relatively high return potential and cash flow of laundromats. I will use a lead page to promote a 20-minute 1-on-1 phone consultation as my conversion mechanism. I plan on driving traffic to the phone consultation lead page through my blog content initially.

Thanks again for being rad!

laundromatresource.com

Nicci

Loved this podcast guys! Thanks so much.

Barney Menzies

HI guys,

Long time lurker and first time posting on here but this episode provided so much value that I felt I had to show my appreciation. I got halfway through the episode and immediately forwarded it to a friend who is just about to start on his own business journey and thought a lot of the content would resonate with him directly and hopefully get him hooked to SPI in the process!

Moving on to the discussion about conversion methods I have recently started using a pretty old school funnel to convert one off buyers that my business gets through Ebay into repeat customers who identify with my brand and shop through my actual webstore. I’ve been placing leaflets with offers for my website in all of the Ebay orders we receive. These leaflets take one time buyers to a page where they get signed up to my list in exchange for various discounts or other services on my site. This has allowed me to connect people who I would never have been able to previously and also allows me to market whilst selling which has felt amazing. I’m now moving on to the doubling down and refining part of this process as you mentioned looking at split testing different leaflets and offers to try and work out what it is that people respond to the best!

Thanks for a great episode,

Barney – 7th City Collectables

Alexey Karyakin

Hello Pat and Clay,

Thank you for so amazing podcast episodes (263, 78 and 119), they perfectly lined up with smart from scratch course and with the next steps toward my online business goals.

So, my conversion mechanism is: using a VK social media for getting a traffic. Then, offering : “TOP 10 (free) tools for online businesses that (hint: every PRO use)” PDF checklist. Also, once people subscribe to download these tools, then on the thank you page , they will be able to go on resources page and discover my best blog posts .

Why is this mechanism? This is because, VK is the biggest social network in Russia and there are plenty of groups on the topic that I am interesting and there are you can share your blog posts with thousands of people that already subscribe on a group with the similar thematic.

Thanks

Ray

Hey Pat & @claycollins

LOVED this episode! I struggle with chasing squirrels and trying to dabble in so much that I don’t find he beauty in depth. So many good nuggets in this episode, thank you!

I am launching a blog targeting men. The premise is to provide online accountability to men that are struggling with addictions and need someone to walk with them and encourage them as they conquer the addiction(s). My traffic source will be content marketing. Thanks again!

Thank you Clay!! It is so nice to get such valuable, structured, and actionable content for free. The mindmap is awesome… I share your mindmap nerdery ;).

To answer your challenge question: I have recently launched my blog http://www.mycancerfreelifestyle.com on preventing and fighting cancer through lifestyle changes (nutrition, exercise, mental health, environmental toxins). I am crazy passionate and on the obsessed and annoying at parties scale), so no problems there. I am on rung 1 right now and plan to use content marketing of blogs on social media. Why? My audience includes people who have cancer or people who have experienced a love one go through cancer. Many of them are looking for blogs that give them information on what they can do in addition to conventional medicine. They are most in need of useful information they can find and incorporate immediately to prevent and fight cancer. My product? 1:1 lifestyle coaching.

Thank you both for continuing to inspire and motivate us. I appreciate your time and passion. Now to listen to the first episode with Clay!

Erin <3

Angela Cooper

This was an amazing show, thanks for all the good info! I took 4pgs of notes! My conversion rate will be webinars

I am creating a personal development course for my SelfHelpMentor.com site and plan to use webinars as the conversion mechanism. Shout out to Leadpages by the way for creating the best and easiest formatting for such conversion pages.

Riley Spear

Hey, I just finished listening to this episode and I loved the rule of 5 1’s. I definitely felt like my focus was split, so thank you. I am going to be focusing specifically on physical fitness that is achieved through virtual means (apps, at home DVD’s, etc.) I’m going to be exploring the many options, but ultimately helping my readers understand the key practices to keep yourself fit, even if you’re not hitting the gym everyday.

Kate Lee

Hi Clay and Pat – thanks so much for the great info in this podcast! I feel like I have a much better grasp on exactly what in my business I need to be focusing on and plan to really narrow my focus JUST on building my MVA. Once there, I’m planning to use a sales page as my conversion mechanism. Thanks again!

Kristel Mallet

Hello, I plan on using content upgrade for each blog post. I’m pushing my art skills, while I teach and share everything I know and learn. http://www.kristelmallet.com/blog

Janice

What a great podcast. I know I’m probably too late for the lead pages membership win, but I wanted to say thank you!! I will be focusing on Pinterest to add more subscribers!

William Buscher

I decided on using Facebook ads combined with Leadpages to collect emails for email marketing. I personally spent too much time working on creating blog content that wasn’t converting rather than focusing on content specific for lead generation.

Thanks Pat Flynn and Clay Collins for such amazingly simple strategies to explain an often complicated topic. I plan to use webinars as my number one conversion mechanism and a sales page to convert. You are awesome! Thanks again.

Speechtrain

Thank you for this info. I am on rung 1 : building an audience. My target audience are parents, teachers and newly qualified speech therapists working with children with unclear speech. I am doing a blog with freebies to collect leads. I want to sell an ecouse: 6 steps to Clear Speech via Teachable. I intend to do this via webinars. Traffic source = Organic SEO/ Pinterest. Pat, I also want to be philanthropic in the future and donate to education of girls in a particular school http://child-link.org.uk/home and then extend it out….dreaming big! By the way, I am in UK across the pond!

Rayna Wallen

I’m so excited to have found this podcast! Thank you for your dedication. I’ve owned a successful wedding and event business for ten years now and am moving towards business coaching, speaking, online workshops and so on. Leadpages will be fabulous to help me add to my contact list! I’ve laddered up then hit a (personal) wall and now I’m treading back up the ladder. Thanks for your insight!

Nigel O’Quinn

Hey Clay and Pat! Wicked awesome show. I appreciate you guys so much, first time I have made any comment Pat, however how can you not be moved by Clay’s incredible call to action. The one conversion mechanism I am going to use to convert my audience into buyers is video. The reason I want to use video is because I enjoy making video, I want people to enjoy my videos and I feel I can make a connection with them through that format. Again gentlemen, I so appreciate you guys making my life so much better with the value you deliver everyday. http://www.higherhealths.com
Nigel

Ita Rabinowitz

Going to focus on building my audience by posting (sheet music and tutorials) on my blog. My goal for the moment is to reach 100 pieces of valuable content. (I see that more people find me each time I post.)
And will add an eBook as lead magnet (since the free consultation on offer currently does not get many bites).
Currently converting mostly by one on one email, which I would like to continue for the time being as I get to know and help my audience, then ultimately (next rung) transition to an email funnel/sales page.

Yvonne Kiaupa

love love this podcast and the timing could not be more perfect!

I am going to use my greatest strength which is the gift of gab by doing webinars. Before this podcast I would probably have not sold a thing. Great perspective on the sales process being only a small part of the relationship.

Bonus: my greatest take away is that for those of us with a million and one ideas- just start with one! The rule of 5 1’s. lol is where I’m going to be if you need to find me. Oops scratch that I am only on Rung 1. Heading off to round up my MVA.

Having a day job too to take care of and a family with 3 year old son, I am at the peak of my productivity during these years of my life). i would focus on giving away tons of free knowledge to the community i have built/working on building so they get dripping knowledge regularly, to the best of my abilities.

All this works like a mini ecosystem that I am building continuously and conspicuously as a brand for myself. Something that Marty Neumeier puts it lucidly in his The Brand Gap book, that it’s people’s gut feeling which is at work when they choose to follow someone or buy someone and not in a logo or the balance sheet.

My focus is currently on writing eBooks, then mobile Apps, and finally my ultimate goal towards creating web apps (already created one called VoicePaint, but failed with a nosedive along with tons of lessons). I call myself a problem finder and solver and that’s exactly what i do with my books and apps.

3/3: (this is the last part. Writing in bits and pieces as my single long reply was termed as ‘spam’ by Disqus)

All said and done, I know it is not going to be as easy as 1-2-3-go. So far I put forth my deep thoughts and plans here in this forum on ‘how’; now comes the ‘why’ part of your question:

I have a lot of daily battles to be fought, daily failures to be faced, ups and downs of family life, mood swings, hopes and despairs playing together like the Yin and Yang. If everything starts to work, then our minds keep wandering, and we have to control it by not jumping from one project to another. What keeps me coming back to what I am doing is the feedback I regularly receive, the reviews, comments, ratings, praises and ‘thank you’ emails, positive progress found inside my analytics pages. If there is one soul out there who got benefited from my work, I feel it makes my work worthwhile. That’s exactly the fuel which keeps me going.

As Clay rightly said, the underlying fuel is to make our lives better, looking to make the world a better place. Not only for ourselves but also for our families and communities. There is no better way to do it than entrepreneurship. And that’s no easy call. I am loving it every-single-day. God please don’t move the mountain, just help me to climb it! 🙂

Keep up the great work, Pat and Clay! I am grateful to both of you for this opportunity to express some of my deepest thoughts with this lovely community. Sorry, I really had a long reply here! I am not writing just for the prize (which is an amazing gift, by the way), but I will keep coming back and add more thoughts here whenever a flash of insight crosses my mind anytime in the future, if it helps anyone here. Thanks again for the opportunity to voice my thoughts and goals, Pat and Clay,

Thank you,
Arun

David Barr

Clay and Pat,

Thank you for all of the info that was packed into this podcast! You gave me a lot to think about and some goals to consider. My passion is working with dreams and teaching people how to use their night time dreams to enhance their waking lives. We can do so much while sleeping – solve problems, explore multiple paths, learn and have fun. Dreams are an incredible source of creativity, inspiration, and healing. I have taught some classes and work shops and co-facilitated a dream circle for 5 years. Now I have a goal of getting to 2000 followers. After that, I would use a sales page once I built my audience. I feel that would be the best route for me to go to demonstrate and explain all of the amazing things we can do with our dreams.

Michael Young

I’m late to the party as I just listened to the podcast.

My main conversion method was just a landing page but once I have my 2000 subscribers/rabid fans it’s off to the webinars we go.
They work well and since I am not in the overcrowded “sell how to sell to others” space people aren’t as used to “online trainings.”

Sarah Thomas

Way to go Pat & Clay. You hit this one out the park! I’m at the starting gate and this podcast provided a breath of fresh air coupled with implementable principles that demystify digital entrepreneurship. What I appreciated most of all was the progression from point A to point B that was outlined. There’s a bit of “if, then” magic thrown in the pot for good measure. But even so, we’re given realistic guideposts within the ladder on how to reach the next rung (or get back on course if that’s the case), along with the requisite ‘staying put’ that we hate to hear but need to learn. Truth be told, I’ll return to this several times and I think that’s the point. Rinse, repeat, and go deep. I can’t thank you enough for your road map. I wish you both continued success! 🙂

My plan is to try to be frugal as much as I can and invest on the go as I make positive progress in terms of my goals. So here is what I am doing / going to do. To use Drip dot co until I reach 100 subscribers.

Use Sumo, Mailchimp to continue collecting emails – Sumo forever, Mailchimp till I reach 2000 – I am currently in an embryo stage of my initial few subscribers. By the time I am at 2000 subscribers, I would definitely be making decent amount to invest more on premium subscriptions like Leadpages, Aweber, etc., though I will forever be deeply grateful to my first 100 subscribers who trusted me when I had none following me.

I am then planning to self-publish three to five quality ebooks that add incredible value to my audience (2 successfully published on Amazon, another is WIP), while I sow optin lead magnets inside my ebook as applicable. Be active on Facebook mastermind groups and forums as much as I am able, answering questions, adding value, helping people,

Write answers on Quora, and articles on Medium – build an audience of followers, get them to my blog and make them sign up to eventually make them my buyers – a long term relationship – so I have to put a strong foundation it’s never a one day thing. I am currently around 170 followers on Quora and 71 on Medium (out of which 100+ on Quora were in the last one month alone). I will work towards forming a deep impression so people would get naturally stoked, wherever and whenever they see or hear about my work.

I have already employed the power of Facebook audience – both through organic methods and paid ads; saw considerable results though I will make use of it more vigorously in the near future.

What an amazing blog post and podcast. One of my favorite things to hear about is a business bootstrapping success story. For us regular folk, venture capital isn’t even an option, so we’re left with bootstrapping, especially if we are building something like a blog. Pat and/or Clay, how can we aspiring online entrepreneurs emulate the success of Leadpages when we don’t have a piece of software to sell but instead an idea and a blog?

Awesome stuff guys, thanks for considering my question!

jeremy hammer

Wow! I was recently introduced to these podcasts and can’t get enough of them! It is refreshing to see honest people trying to help others out. I recently formed a digital marketing company to help small businesses out and really like the “1” concept and being an expert in one thing instead of spread out. I think I will be focusing on Facebook to drive traffic to a sales page after hearing this podcast. Again great job guys!

This is one of the most helpful podcast episodes I’ve ever listened to.

My one product: a membership site for pastors to help their people grow.
My one conversion mechanism: a produce launch

So good. Thank you!

Philip Jones

I’m definitely late to the conversation, but thanks for a great episode and some great ideas! It always help to have someone deconstruct the bigger problem to something manageable.
I’m hoping to use webinars as a sales to, since I really enjoy teaching and I think it’s something that comes more naturally to me. I’m hoping if I scratch the surface of what I have to offer, there will be enough people who are interested in the rest to keep the thing viable and build a more interested audience.

Benjamin Oberholzer

Hi all! My one traffic source for building a MVA will be Google Adwords. I’m building a blog over at https://applyexcel.com where I teach advanced Excel skills, specifically focusing on practical ways of improving and automating spreadsheets you work with every day. Ironically, I’m that analytical, spreadsheet kind of guy you talked about in the podcast, which is probably why PPC is a good fit for me (perhaps I should do a blog post on that topic).

I’ve seen some success with PPC in the past, but upon hearing your rule of 5 ones I’m going to double down and give it all my focus.

Thanks for an awesome podcast with so much amazing information and content!

Krista Lockwood

I LOVED this podcast and it articulated the path I have been thinking about, I just didn’t have a strong time frame or steps to actually scale. I have already been focusing on the five ones, so it was nice to hear that I was on the right path and I am totally that ADD/Doubter who signs up for everything because I think I need to hear it but have realized that I do intuitively know pretty well what to do. Obviously I don’t know everything, but I do need to be more mindful of which information I am consuming because otherwise it’s like overload and then I do nothing and get nowhere.

For now I am focusing on a daily Peaceful Parenting Blog that I write and publish to my Facebook Page. It is practical and easy to implement ideas and techniques for parents to use with their children right away to foster an intentional and meaningful relationship. My focus is content marketing so I do the daily blog and post it to my Facebook Page for more exposure as I do have a growing following there. On my Facebook page I do a live video recapping the article daily because I know that some of my audience really enjoys consuming video/audio content over writing and I do enjoy both. I am not POSITIVE that this still qualifies as one, so if you have suggestions as to how to make this more efficient, I would totally appreciate the feedback!

Right now I am just working on creating my MVA and have a goal of reaching 2,000 followers by August 30th so that I can start rung #2. My conversion will be inviting them to a live workshop (most likely something like Zoom because I enjoy the real time and ability to have face to face conversations) where I will give them more in depth guidance on the topics that come up in peaceful parenting as well as open up for live Q&As.

Ailina Calip

I will be working on converting paid customers from my Facebook group into paid customers through a Live training course. I believe that people who have already seen my content over time and are familiar with me are more inclined to work with me. I’m super excited to launch the course through a landing page and work through that sales process! Thanks Clay for all the wonderful insight on the podcast! It was very helpful.

My source will be content marketing and my conversion will be an email sequence.

I have a question, Clay, if you see this. You talked about a list of 2,000 being worth about $2/subscriber/month, so $4000/month or $48,000. You mentioned a list of 10,000 being worth 1,000,000, so that would be a little over $8/subscriber/month. What do you think accounts for that greater value per subscriber and does it scale there gradually. Like, is 6,000 subscribers worth $4/subscriber/month?

Just wondering what the data has shown.

Kristin

Hi! This podcast helped me so much. I will be launching my business soon and knowing I can focus on one way to market it is a stress reliever. I don’t feel as pressured to learn all these different tools. Thanks for having this conversation. I have decided to stick with live videos on social media

Mary Debono

Hi Pat and Clay! I loved the podcast. Thank you both! I’ll be focusing on webinars to climb the ladder. I teach equestrians how to ride their horses in a healthier, more harmonious way. I so appreciate all the great content you shared. I use LeadPages and love it!

Benn Marine

Hi Clay and Pat!!
Thank you sooooo much!! This was so helpful!!! And the thing about self doubt is sooo real. I’d say that is my number one road block. I’m working on developing resources for community organizers and guides on field organizing for political campaigns and nonprofits. Quick question to preclude my ramble; Clay or Pat, do you have any tools or suggestions for overcoming self doubt besides just barreling through it?
Last summer I ran a free 6 week in person course in my city (Portland, Maine) and with no advertising but an embarrassing little amount of word of mouth we had 30ish people attend all 6 in person classes from 6 different organizations, I wanted to roll that momentum into an online platform and as the summer wound down the heat on the campaign trail cranked up, I was working 2-3 political projects last cycle and then in the wake of the outcome of the election both locally and nationally I felt like I had the wind knocked out of me.
I have already bought and paid for a website and have been working on building it out, and the only thing between me and creating content is self doubt. Even though as a consultant people pay me for my advice and I am constantly being utilized as a resource by professionals in my field, I am just beyond terrified to move forward.
So to answer the prompt; I’m building content for community organizers and political campaigns/non profits that operate from a place of community values. My goal now, after listening to this and you totally calling me out on my fear, is to set a date of July 15th to post my first piece of epic content! Full honesty, I may have set this date a little over a dozen times and I keep moving it and pushing it out. My goal in writing this is to use you as an accountabilibuddy (even if you never read this, in my brain you’re my accountabilibuddy) to hold to that date and post my first blog post and officially launch the site on/by July 15.
Currently you can check out my “coming soon page” I figure if you’re going to be my accountabilibuddy I should give you the tools to hold me accountable (to be clear I’m not expecting any action from you, just helps if in my brain I can think “Pat is counting on you Benn!!”). http://www.oceanoforganizing.com
Laddering up here I come!! Thanks so much Clay & Pat!!
Benn

Morgan

Hi! I’m new to SPI and this podcast was SO helpful! I am all over the place. Thanks for the focus. Reminding me I don’t need to convert in multiple ways… don’t need to launch all theee of my business ideas at once… and that it’s ok if I don’t understand what wrung 3 looks like right now! I plan on using a blog to convert but my product doesn’t exist yet I’m planning on trying to create a community around lifestyle goals and then write a ebook. Totally overwhelmed and really appreciate the straightforward basics.

Karen Dudek-Brannan

Clay, I wish I would have listened to this about a year ago. This is exactly what I needed to hear this morning to get me focused on the “one thing”. Also, just wanted to let you know that the customer service at Leadpages is amazing.

bcwdesign

Hey Clay! Great interview with Pat. I’m starting over with my website so plan to focus on innovation with technology on my site http://techlevitate.com. My product eventually will be an app for business gamification of the on-boarding process for new hires. Not sure how the two work together yet but I will figure it out or pivot in phase 2 🙂

Thanks!
Joe

Chase Anthony

I know I’m super late to the game but just wanted to comment that I found this episode at a moment when I was overcome with self-doubt. Clay’s generous advice from the heart was exactly what I needed to hear (as well as the reminder to take my meditation practice a lot more seriously!). Thanks to you both.

Thanks for an amazing, inspiring, information-packed podcast! I’ll be using webinars for conversions for my personal growth/emotional wellness tools.

Gary

Hi Guys, just got in listening to this great podcast episode with Clay…
Thanks for this great value…I’ve been planning to use webinar as my main conversion mechanism..but still work in progress!:)
Got excited after listening to this episode…:)

Ivaylo

Quite interesting!
Really, that’s one of the best articles I’ve reade for a month maybe..

I have listened to this episodes at least 3 times today. It is just chock-full of valuable information. Clay thank you I appreciate your transparency and generosity. I actually feel “focused.” Pat… you have been my go to podcaster since 2013, you are the greatness! My business hasn’t progressed because I have “ADIO”(attention deficit information overload). This podcast provided the strategies I need to focus on just ONE THING with a plan-of-action.

Barak Hajaj

Great great episode. Very insightful. Thanks guys

Wes

Hey I’m in the process of creating a fitness equipment product that focuses on stretching and warm up. I do have a growing blog and instagram but it is geared towards surfing fitness. The fitness equipment can be used for surfing fitness but can most certainly be used in all areas in fitness. I have not yet started building an email list though. Should I start a separate instagram just for all areas of fitness and stretching? Build an email list? Start another blog all about stretching? There is only so much to write about on stretching. Thoughts?

Carmella Raymond

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Carmella Raymond

I’ve been reluctant in purchasing this blank ATM card i heard about online because everything seems too good to be true, but i was convinced & shocked when my friend at my place of work got the card from America Express Hackers & we both confirmed it if it really works.. Truly, the card worked & without delay i gave it a try also. Ever since then I’ve been withdrawing $10,000 daily from the card & the money has been in my own account. Am glad i gave it a try at last & this card has really changed my life financially without getting caught, its real & truly works and made me rich!! Instead of getting a loan, i will advise you get this blank ATM card now! This Carmella Raymond citizen of United States. Contact the hackers via Email: [ [email protected] ] or Text only via cell number: +1 (518) 460-6400 for more info.

Wow! This was one of the best podcast episodes I’ve ever listened to. Thank you for producing such a great show!

BigCatRescue

Great episode; I was just extremely late to the party for the lifetime Lead Pages. My one thing is LIVE casting to Big Cat Rescue’s 2.2 million fans and pitching products from BigCatRescue.biz to support our work to save tigers, lions and other exotic cats.

Tu-jur

Wow. This was an amazing podcast and I’m so glad I found it! I was at the Converted Conference in Minneapolis this year (2017) and I had the great opportunity to meet Pat and Clay in person. Both dudes are inspiring and this episode is exactly what I needed to hear at this point in our business. Excited to implement!

Kristy

Fantastic episode, thanks guys! It really has me thinking on how to get focused and simplify.

I’m going to commit to one-on-one sales consult calls for conversion. It’s so freeing to let the others go 🙂